Rodrigo Braga: Imperial’s own Stevie Wonder

If this was the NME, I would start this article with a sentence like “Rodrigo Braga sounds like the illegitimate lovechild of Stevie Wonder and Paul Simon backed by a Samba band,” but it’s not, so I won’t. Rodrigo Braga is an excellent singer, guitarist and songwriter who performs meaningful and intelligent music which, if approached from a genre perspective, could plausibly be described as a fusion of American and Brazilian folk music. Now that’s proper music journalism.

Rodrigo’s music is complex, sophisticated, surprising and subtly jazz-influenced. On songs like Drumbeatz (which can be found on Youtube), you can hear the professionalism and musicianship leaking through your speakers, while Apollo 18, a song about rejection of modern culture, leaves the listener drenched in wit.

All this leaves me wondering why Braga is not hundreds of times more popular than he is. At a recent gig at Earl’s Court’s The Troubadour, he performed a show-stopping set of fantastic songs which would have had the entire audience dancing had they not got the entire audience thinking first. The distinctly mediocre pop-rock of Braga’s support, Feldspar, only highlighted how much of a gem he is amongst a sea of dull musicians.

Braga’s debut, Between The Waves, is free to stream at www.rodrigobraga.co.uk