Tribo records new CD in Switzerland! Learn more!

Tribo de Jah arrived in Europe, in the second stage of its international tour. After 12 shows in the United States and performing at the Montreal Reggae Festival in Canada, Tribo began its European season with its first show in the Netherlands, near the city of Rotterdam. Despite the local language being an insurmountable barrier, the band managed to put on a show capable of surprising and infecting the crowd. After that show the band began recording its new album in Switzerland, where it is currently based while preparing for new shows in Europe. The predictable title for this new CD is "Tribo in Version".

The idea is an old project that had been demanded by the record label and is only now being put into practice: an album basically of covers with possible unreleased songs. Asked about this project, Fauzi Beydoun, the band's vocalist, gave us the following statement: "For a long time we nurtured the desire to do some covers of reggae classics and world music. The intention basically is to cover songs that for us have a very special meaning, for having marked some moment in our lives or simply for being masterpieces that, rather than daring to do something similar, we simply chose to reproduce them, sometimes adapting only the lyrics into Portuguese.

Some are exactly the kind of song one would have liked to have written out of total identification or pure empathy. Just to cite a few examples, there is a song by Freddie Macgregor that is a rarity and practically nobody knows, yet it is an undisputed reggae classic, which is Love Jah So. It is a song I would surely have liked to have written.

Another example could be 2000 Years by Burning Spear - here it is not so much the combination of lyrics and music that distinguished it but rather an irresistible swing that makes it extremely singular. Another case is Esquinas by Djavan. When I heard this song for the first time I found it simply beautiful, mainly because I totally identified with the lyrics - right away I thought... this is a song I would have liked to have written. Others date back to more distant times, like the song by Janis Joplin called Piece of My Heart. Janis was a singer I really enjoyed in the past to the point of putting her name on my daughter.

Another band I really enjoyed when I was not yet very versed in reggae was Deep Purple, a long time ago obviously. They have a song that perhaps few people know but that I personally find beautiful, which is Soldier of Fortune. Not to break the rule, a song that was missing when we did the Tribute to Bob Marley was Turn Your Lights Down Low, which in fact there was no time to do at the time and ended up being included in this new work. Tribo did a reggae version of it that more closely resembles rhythm and blues in the original and, of course, in Portuguese. We already know that many people will criticize the choice for being a romantic song but I personally really enjoy singing romantic songs.

What I don't think is right is singing "only" romantic songs, that would be too much. Another problem is also that Marley's lyrics are poetically not very elaborate and even doing a totally literal translation, as was the case with this song, many people think we are distorting the meaning of the music or talking nonsense.

Once a journalist found ridiculous a verse from a Marley cover that said... "I say that uoh, uoh, I like, like"... perhaps he did not know that Bob Marley was saying exactly the same thing. Another classic that features a special guest is Equal Rights, by Peter Tosh, which had its base recorded by the band led by George Fullwood, Tosh's bassist for practically his entire solo career, which also features legendary figures such as Tony Chin, Jawdge Hughes and singer Donavan.

Passing through Switzerland, they came to lend a hand and recorded this song with Tribo. In this case the version will have English and Portuguese, with Zé Orlando and Donavan on vocals. There is also Money by Pink Floyd, Ilha Bela by Carlinhos Veloz, among others.

We know it is another great challenge in the band's career but we have always liked challenges. When we recorded the last album we had many songs left over that could easily have made another album and that we greatly regretted not having made it onto the last released album. These songs are ready to be released because they have been recorded for a long time.

Therefore, it is not for lack of material that we chose Tribo in Version, especially because it is much more difficult to do a cover of a classic than to compose a new song. The question is simply to innovate, to find new alternatives. But above all it is a work to be listened to as a whole. I say this because many times a person hears a song on the radio in isolation and forms a partial idea of a work. And despite working with covers, the ideological side of the messages will always be present, if only because that is the band's original proposal.

In this case, the covers chosen are those that are in tune with the band's ideal when it comes to more critical content. In the case of romantic songs, the pleasure of singing prevails much more, after all, music is also entertainment for the band and for the listeners. We hope this will also be a well-received work, as has happened with the band's previous ones."