Meet Maurotelefunksoul from Kafundó Vol. 1

Another guest post by Maga Bo: DJ, producer, and co-founder of Kafundó Records. In this post he gives us a little background on Maurotelefunksoul. His collaboration with A.MA.SSA. “Apache Nagoh (Rasteira Edit),”  appears on the Kafundó Vol. 1 Compilation.

Having begun his career as a DJ in 1992, Mauro Telefunksoul has become omni-present figure in the local dj/electronic music scene in Salvador, Bahia as well as electronic music events around Brazil. His DJ sets and production covers a lot of ground – Dutch House, breakbeat, moombahton, dubstep, drum ’n’ bass, Brazilian Electronic Music, “black music,” nu-jazz and beyond.

When Renato Martins of Funk na Caixa sought him out to release some of his own productions for release on the newly formed Braza Music, Mauro also passed on other tracks from Bahia – LordBreu, Braunation, A.MA.SSA, DJ Mangaio and Lord Voodoo. Renato loved the tracks and they decided to put together an EP – Bahia Bass #1, which they thought was more apt than axé bass (cited by Bruno Natal in Globo in an early article talking about this new musical scene), as it encompassed much more than just axé, from the Reconcavo Baiano and other sounds from the interior and the sertão to a kind of “urban cyber” music….all of this being aggregated and mashed together in Salvador, whether it’s samba reggae, pagode, arrocha, samba de roda, axé music or whatever else – it all gets thrown in there… While the scene in Bahia has benefitted from some governments initiatives (financing a compilation on the culture of bass music in Bahia last year), for the most parts their work is completely DIY – from promotion, recording sets, remixing to producing festas. They have plans to release Bahia Bass Vol. 2 in october as well as EPs and albums of artists within the bass music scene.

What blew us away were his new productions:

…and this track, which is on Kafundó Vol. 1:

That last one is a collaboration between Mauro and Rafa Dias and Mahal Pita of A.MA.$$A, a duo of up-coming producers making waves in Salvador’s bass music scene. A pioneer and active participant of ragga in Brazil, the São Paulo based Carioca singer Jimmy Luv,  brings the ragga to this electro samba reggae arrocha axé agglomeration of influences.

An adept at mash-ups, here’s a maculelê/africa bambaataa mashup, decidedly on the pop side of things, this track makes some very interesting connections from the Afro-Braziian traditional roots rhythm that helped give birth to Funk Carioca and the electro hip hop from the Bronx:

Another interesting mash-up that Chief Boima wrote about some time ago over on Africa is a Country, here’s a remix/mash-up of Filhos de Jorge and Gnonnas Pedro “Zirigui Yiri Boum”:



A championship scratch DJ on the RedBull circuit in Brazil, he’s also a prolific internet presence, you can find loads of Mauro’s mixes, mashups and remixes at his Mixcloud site.