Globetrotting electronic producer/DJ João Barbosa, AKA Branko, just dropped a new mix featuring previously unreleased material from Azealia Banks and Buraka Som Sistema. Listen to "Branko Presents 10 Years of Lisbon Sound" below.
The mainstay of the Lisbon club scene curated the set for his residency on Portugal's terrestrial radio station, Antena 3, with the aim of highlighting the past decade of the port city's global club scene. The mix features Portuguese producers like DJ Marfox, Dotorado Pro and Diamond Bass among others.
As Barbosa explains in the Soundcloud description of the mix, the never-before-heard Azealia Banks track is actually under the moniker Miss Bank$. Back in 2011, the Harlem-based rapper teamed up with Buraka Som Sistema to record a version of the song "Kalemba (Wegue Wegue)."
Anyone who has had the opportunity to watch MTV while traveling in Europe at any point in the past decade could tell you that Branko is well-known as part of the seminal Portuguese electronic dance music collective, Buraka som Sistema. They've won some awards and helped spawn some global club subgenres like zouk bass and progressive kuduro.
2016 marks the 10th anniversary of the collective's first EP, From Buraka to the World, which is why, as Barbosa states in the aforementioned preface to the mix's tracklist, he "had to make a reference to that and do a selection of my favorite tracks with this special Lisbon flavour that have been released over the last 10 years."
2015 saw the arrival of Branko's first full-length solo album, Atlas, which dropped in September by his Lisbon-based Enchufada label. The album is the result of Barbosa's recent journey to studios in Capetown, Amsterdam, Sao Paulo, New York and of course Lisbon.
According to a press release, the global musical journey that resulted in Atlas was in partnership with Red Bull, and the goal was to work with local artists within each scene in order to challenge the notion that there is nothing new under the sun. They brought a film crew with them and created a mini web-series about the journey as well.
While a sponsored adventure through various scenes and recording studios across the globe might seem like a red flag for some serious cultural misappropriation, Kalaf Epalanga, who is also a member of Buraka Som Sistema and co-founder of Enchufada, penned a thoughtful piece for Thump about the cultural intersection that is so clutch to Lisbon culture that addresses any such potential qualms.
During Branko's stop in London while on tour this past fall, he also dropped an exclusive mix for Clash Music, which you can listen to below.
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