Sergio Mendes & Brasil 66 on Oct. 31, 1967 Jerry Lewis Show

[lj]

This show was the first time I saw the group on TV, so I thought I'd check to see if YouTube had it. Lo and behold it was there with Portuguese subtitles! You'll see some nifty close ups of Lani Hall and Janis Hansen. They perform two musical gems--"Watch What Happens" and everyone's favorite "The Frog." Go fast forward to 21:58 for their performance.

After all these years I still regret the breakup of the original Brasil 66. Despite future iterations of Brasil 66, 77, 88 etc., there was nothing to compare to the vocal and instrumental sound of the original group of the first three albums.

 

[Mike Blakesley]

I agree with your last paragraph, although each B'66 lineup produced some killer tracks. To this day I think Sergio's music sounds best when he forgoes the synths and plays acoustic piano.

Personally I wish that Stillness had been a bigger hit. It would have been great to hear more music in that vein. Not that I didn't like Pais Tropical -- I did -- but Stillness is unique among Sergio's catalog.

 

[Dave]

Pais Tropical seemed to be an awakening from the sleepy non-commercial period... Stillness just didn't have the impact it should have, nor did too many others following, say, Fool On The Hill...


-- Dave

 

[JMK]

I wonder how many people in the audience were permanently blinded by Lani's earring?

Crystal Illusions sold very well, and produced two reasonably sized hits (especially on Adult Contemporary). Ye-Me-Le was kind of a placeholder, but B66 had two more AC hits from Stillness, despite the lackluster sales of the album. Stillness, Pais Tropical and Primal Roots are now all available for download on Amazon, BTW. Interestingly, the download of Pais Tropical does not have the dropout on Gone Forever that was on the CD.

 

[JeffM]

I wonder how many people in the audience were permanently blinded by Lani's earring?

Funny how those 50's and 60's TV cameras always produced that "black halo" around bright reflective objects. You see it in lots of tape shows from those days; not so much later on. (Any TV engineers out there who know the answer?)

Reminds me too of those horse-blanket plaids and checkers local TV sportscasters all seemed to like; which turned into "psychedelic" moire' patterns on-camera.

 

[Robert P]

Pretty unique performance on shaker!

 

[Brasil_Nut]

Karen crawling all over the place in a silver "space suit" on the Fred Astaire show tops them all. Lost in Space meets Brasil '66?

Jon...the "Brasil Nut"