São Paulo's Afro-Brazilian groove visionaries Bixiga 70 return with an ecstatic 5th album – Vapor – their first in four years. The sound is joyful, a series of potent horn driven melodies and infectious polyrhythms. More than a return, Vapor is a rebirth. An exuberant, full-tilt party.

“We knew we needed to make a new album. But could we do it?’

That was the question Daniel Nogueira and other members of Brazil’s Bixiga 70 asked themselves as they gathered to record Vapor. An entire age had passed since their last album in 2018; the whole world had changed. The Covid pandemic had hit Brazil especially hard, leaving the entire country shuttered for far too long. On top of that, after more than a decade together, some old members of the ten-piece instrumental band had left and new ones arrived. It was time to take a deep breath and see if they could still make magic.

They could.

“It’s not just the next album,” baritone sax player Cuca Ferreira points out, “it’s really different. It’s a reset, like re-founding the band. With new people, we had to get to know them and create music together. They brought different colours and ideas.”

One of those ideas is apparent at the very start of the opening track, “Malungu”: the chiming keyboards herald the greater role for the instrument in the band. They introduce one of the new band members, Pedro Regada, coming from the northeast of Brazil and bringing his own style and influences.