GUERRA CIVIL CANIBAL

And Ratos do Porão have made it into the year 2000. Started about 20 years ago in the suburbs of São Paulo, the famed Brazilian punk band release their 11th album – actually an EP that lasts little longer than fourteen minutes –, one that stands for a survival certificate. "Eu vi a morte!" ("I saw death!"), roars (as usual) lead vocalist João Gordo in Obesidade Mórbida Constitucional (Constitutional Morbid Obesity). But this time around he’s not kidding: the lyrics talk about how he was frightened after a pneumonia crisis that nearly killed him. The track is a hardcore bump that finishes with the reading of Gordo's medical report. Nonetheless, Guerra Civil Canibal is not the most inspired Ratos do Porão album. It sounds nothing like the bulldozer music of Brasil (1989) and the lyrics have lost Gordo’s morbid insights. It’s more of a recreational record, featuring a Sepultura version (Biotech is Godzilla) and a mockery track (Kill the Varukers) written for the band with whom Ratos toured Europe in 1998. It’s ok, anyway. After all, as they remind us on the back cover, "discs are culture".(Silvio Essinger)