Raul Seixas

In Brazil, Raul Seixas stood as a cornerstone of rock music whose extensive catalog of recordings continues to inspire fresh covers by Caetano Veloso, Margareth Menezes, and additional artists. His efforts proved essential in laying the groundwork for the genre across the country.

João Gilberto, Luiz Gonzaga, and the rock pioneers Bill Haley and Elvis Presley—whose records reached him through acquaintances employed at the American Consulate in Salvador—shaped his early sound. In 1959 he assembled the Panthers, later renamed Os Panteras, a quartet featuring guitar, bass, drums, and Seixas on lead vocals that introduced electric instruments to Salvador audiences. The group blended rock with baião through distinctive renditions of Luiz Gonzaga material, generating performances so surreal that many parents banned their children from attending. While channeling the spirit of Jovem Guarda into a Bahian context, Seixas approached the enterprise lightly, enrolling in philosophy, law, and psychology courses at college. Exposure to anti-psychiatry prompted him to drop these studies; he then married an American woman whose father served as a Protestant preacher. She assumed the role of primary provider by teaching English, while he spent her savings on a motorcycle and roamed Salvador at dawn instead of purchasing an apartment, forcing the couple to reside with his family.

During a 1967 concert in Salvador, Jerry Adriani enlisted Os Panteras as his backing band. Impressed by their sound, he persuaded the musicians to relocate to Rio, where they cut their debut LP, Raulzito e os Panteras, for Odeon—an album in which Seixas probed metaphysical themes and the seven Aristotelian questions. The release met with complete public indifference. Adriani subsequently moved Seixas to CBS, where the latter produced projects for Trio Ternura, Osvaldo Nunes, Renato e seus Blue Caps, Adriani, Wanderléia, and the broader iê-iê-iê contingent. At that time Seixas brought in Sérgio Sampaio and Edith Cooper, two emerging Brazilian musicians, and joined forces with Miriam Batucada to record Sociedade da Grã-Ordem Kavernista Apresenta a Sessão Das Dez. CBS quickly withdrew the highly experimental album, which merged jazz and marchinhas while addressing chaos in philosophical terms, and dismissed Seixas. His provocative appearance at the 7th International Song Festival (FIC) in 1972, performing “Let Me Sing, Let Me Sing” and “Eu Sou eu, Nicuri é o Diabo,” contributed to the decision, since the label preferred to avoid a producer who doubled as a star. Nevertheless, the show cemented Seixas’s central place in Brazilian rock & roll for both enthusiasts and critics. Later that year Philips engaged him to record Os 24 Grandes Sucessos da Era do Rock, listing him solely as producer and arranger. Once Seixas achieved fame, the album resurfaced in 1975 as 20 Anos de Rock with proper credit for his performances.

Around this era Seixas bonded with the internationally renowned esoteric author Paulo Coelho following a shared sighting of a flying saucer in Barra da Tijuca; Coelho would contribute to most of Seixas’s subsequent successes. The 1973 release Krig-ha, Bandolo yielded Seixas’s breakthrough hit “Ouro de Tolo” along with “Al Capone,” “Mosca na Sopa,” and “Metamorfose Ambulante.” The partnership continued to generate singles such as “Gitâ” from the 1974 album of the same name, “Tente Outra Vez” from Novo aeon (1975), “Eu Nasci Há dez Mil Anos Atrás” (1976), and “Maluco Beleza” plus “O Dia Em que a Terra Parou” (both on the 1977 WEA album O Dia Em que a Terra Parou, the latter serving as an anthem for Brazilian hippiedom).

Eight further LPs, complicated by repeated shifts among record companies and health setbacks tied to drug and alcohol use, included the hits “Como Vovô Já Dizia” (1975), “Rock Das Aranha” (1980), “Cowboy Fora-Da-Lei” (1987), “Capim-Guiné,” and “Carimbador Maluco” (1983, featured in the children’s musical Plunct, Plact, Zuum on TV Globo). In 1989 Seixas joined Marcelo Nova, a longtime admirer and former member of the punk rock outfit Camisa de Vênus, to create Panela do Diabo for Warner. The album captured a visibly weakened Seixas, whose condition deteriorated further during the ensuing tour. His death in August of that year did not lessen the devotion of his fan base. He became the first Brazilian artist whose fan club assembled and issued an LP—the 1985 collection Let Me Sing My Rock-and-Roll of rare tracks, later reissued by Polygram as Caroço de Manga. Additional artists who have covered his material include Caetano Veloso (“Ouro de Tolo”), Irmãs Galvão (“Tente Outra Vez”), Margareth Menezes (“Mosca na Sopa”), Deborah Blando (“A Maçã”), and RPM (“Gitâ”). Marking the fiftieth anniversary of his birth in 1995, the book O trem das Sete appeared from Nova Sampa, and his debut album, Sociedade Grã-Kavernista Apresenta Sessão das Dez, received a CD reissue.