An introduction to baile funk’s abrasive, addictive new wave

thefader.com:

Brazil has long been a laboratory for sonic innovation, synthesizing the unique musical traditions of the country’s diverse population.

At the cutting edge is baile funk, a sound that stems back decades but evolves in new directions at a lightning-fast rate, reinventing itself as a genre as unexpectedly as the beat switches.

You can still hear traces of the electro, Miami bass, and early hip-hop styles it evolved from in the off-kilter rhythms and metallic shards of noise, but baile funk has become its own complex musical ecosystem, with a diverse spectrum of regional variants and specific subgenres.

Hip-hop began as dance music, but American rap music frequently has a cagey relationship to its origins in the discotheque and roller rink, often privileging the mental stimulation of clever lyricism over the physical exhilaration of live performance.