ORUA (Brazil) + Supports

Formed during one of the most turbulent periods in recent Brazilian history (which has seen a coup d’état, political imprisonment, and the rise of the extreme right), Oruã was idealized by Lê Almeida, a cultural agitator in Rio’s independent scene, through his label Transfusão Noise Records.

Based around the meeting point that became the Escritório, a space of collective creation which fosters an artistic community and a music scene that dialogues with the Brazilian underground from a unique place, Oruã emerged in improvisation sessions that mixed repetitive bass lines, electric phrases and indie guitar solos, doses of feedback and wall of noise to afrobeat and Brazilian references that ranged from Luiz Gonzaga’s primal Pernambuco sound to Brazilian guitar references. The name came about when Lê heard Lee Ranaldo during a concert in Brazil pronouncing something similar to what would become the band’s name. He jotted it down on a piece of paper in the dark, and the next day the Sonic Youth guitarist had baptized the group without knowing it.

At the same time that fascist extremism was coming out of the sewers to reach federal power, a new racial consciousness was emerging in the country. And it reached Lê, born in one of the poorest areas of Rio de Janeiro, Baixada Fluminense, who then began to realize that he was not only a key player in the Brazilian independent scene, but that his work echoed the resistance of ancestors who fought to be able to do what they wanted, even if they were forbidden. This awakening coincided with the moment in which the group went all in around Brazil and the world, crossing state borders in the US and countries in Europe, which inevitably affected the band’s sound.

Two international tours brought Oruã closer to the foreign market, a path they had already been following in other ways, such as when they were discovered by the leader of the classic American band Built to Spill, indie guitar hero Doug Martsch.