Interview RSS Listen to the the
phone interview

Video Bebel Gilberto
"Momento"

With a new album and supporting tour on the way, spring 2007 was set up to be a joyous time for Brazilian singer Bebel Gilberto.

But a misstep as she was hailing a cab near her home in New York City changed all that, and the daughter of Brazilian music royalty was forced to postpone the tour, take a step back, and recover from a broken foot--she even had to rehearse with her band via Skype.

On the road to recovery, Gilberto spoke with MP3.com about her new album, Momento, toughing it out on tour, being a true New Yorker, and appreciating the remix.

Hey there Bebel, this is Jim Welte at MP3.com. Hi, how are you? Oh, good, how are you? I'm fine. Thank you. Do you have a few minutes? Of course. Great. I don't want to spend too much time on it if it's a sore subject, but I just was curious how the foot's feeling. Thank you. I'm standing on it now. I was unlucky to have the accident but very lucky to have such a great recovery. It's been really surprising. I'm doing much better than supposedly I could be. OK. That's good. I just have to do my physical therapy, and I just hate doing it. That's one of those things that you have to stick with to heal properly. Yeah. And I don't want to do it. Is it a couple of days a week? Yes, it's a couple of days a week, and I run around, but I'm doing acupuncture and, you know, I just have to have a system. It's like a forever thing, you know, go to the gym, blah, blah, blah, all that things that I never did in my life. Right. Those things that require a considerable amount of discipline. Exactly, but then you fix it, it's good for your heart. It's good for your head and also for your leg. Then, you know, it makes you try to do that, and it's never too late to start a healthy life. Absolutely. But the injury didn't seem to be slowing you down too much when you were here in San Francisco last month. You were seated a little bit, but you were still getting around. Yeah, yeah. I think I managed to do it quite well. I hope you and the audience liked it. I was doing it with all my heart. Did you enjoy that tour, or was it a little bit of a burden because of the injury and having to work around it and that kind of thing? I'm not going to lie to you that it was easy, but I must say to you that I survived. I would feel terrible if I had to have canceled those dates. I would hate myself forever and feel guilty and all that. So, I'm feeling quite OK. I got some bad reviews. I got some good reviews, but the most important thing is that I really, really learned a lot from having a limitation but also still keep doing it when you have to do it. And I think that's the most important thing, and when you're an artist, that's part of the deal. You kind of have to be unbreakable. Right. You have to find that balance between giving your fans what they want and what they deserve but also being smart about not further injuring yourself and that kind of thing. Exactly. Did you really use Skype to rehearse for the tour with your band? I did. That's so interesting. Was it simply so that you could have the opportunity to check in with them and make sure they were hitting their points and that kind of thing? Exactly, yeah. I just was like kind of monitoring them and they would rehearse it by themselves and then we'd agree on a friendly time, and then I'd call them up and then listen to everything, and also the fact that we could see each other in the camera was quite interesting. I could see them rehearsing. I could know, and I could hear very well what was going on--so well that I could even complain if I thought that a bass line from the keyboard was too busy or something.

I could still tell that, and I probably was driving them crazy, but I think I have a great band. We are friends. They were really supportive and, yeah, we rehearsed. I was in bed. I couldn't really move. I had to keep my foot up, but with the laptop on my lap and just like controlling and making notes. I'm glad, you know. It's incredible. I'm very happy. It's a pretty ringing endorsement of the technology. Exactly. Oh, yeah. So, you've been in New York for a few years now. I'm curious to talk about the new record and how much of an influence being a New Yorker, or living in New York, was on writing this record and putting it together? Being in New York and having the pleasure of working with friends that live here was great. Also, thank God for technology again, we could go to the studio and record some nice vocals, but then decide that they were kind of stiff and then we just can go back home and do different vocals. Like on "Bring Back the Love," for instance, I did the chorus beat in a studio and I sang the verse over there at [Brazilian Girls' keyboardist] Didi Gutman's house. It was a hot summer's day with no air condition and mosquitoes around me biting me, but we just thought that that was the right vibe, because I was thinking more spontaneously than when I was thinking before. You mentioned working with Didi and Sabina [Sciubba] of the Brazilian Girls. How did that come together? I know you guys have been friends for quite a while. Well, Didi has been my very close friend, Didi and Sabina, both of them, and they know me so well, I actually asked them to write me a song. And they came up with the "Bring Back the Love" idea and, and I did some touch-ups in the song, but that song is basically theirs. And then we liked that and then we decided to do more and then we did "Os Novos Yorkinos."

We wrote that on a day that we went to see U2, and we got totally gone. For me, I never have seen U2, and I don't really go to any concerts, especially at Madison Square Garden. Right after the show we just went straight up to the studio. And we were like drunk and happy, and we wrote "Os Novos Yorkinos." That's an excellent story. So the party vibe of a U2 concert inspired you. Yeah, it was the vibe. How quickly after moving to New York did you feel like a true New Yorker? Or do you feel like one? I totally am a New Yorker. One of the problems when I had the accident, for instance, it was that I was a New Yorker, and I just forgot how important it is sometimes just to let people come to you and embrace you because when you become a New Yorker you become a loner unless you have a family. But for me, I am like, you know, artist, single, traveling all the time, and then I had to go back to that system. And I'm such a New Yorker that I cannot even ask someone to grab me a glass of water because I just go and get it myself. Right. You know, and you just want to do things the way you do like waiting for a plate of food when someone is coming and saying, 'Oh, can you please get in the fridge and then warm up for me a little bit because I cannot manage to go there.' Oh, that was tough. It forced you to slow down a little bit. Oh, for sure. Well, I haven't been able to run for three months. I was about to cross the street with a friend yesterday, and she says, 'Let's go.' I said, 'No, I don't run. Did you forget that?' It was so interesting because, thank God, with my respect for the New Yorkers, I kind of, you know, got a little bit of quality life back. That's excellent. That's good. Sometimes that's hard to do with the the fast pace and the fact that you're always on the move and that kind of thing.

So, I wanted to talk about remixes. They were such a big part of [Gilberto's first album] Tanto Tempo. And it seems like you were comfortable with seeing your songs remixed and that kind of thing. Has that changed over time, or are you still very much at peace with letting producers and DJs remix your songs? I think you have to be open-minded, at least for me. I haven't achieved the biggest success that I can absolutely control the art or myself. You know what I mean? Or how it's going to be perceived. I basically dance with the music. OK. And literally, as a singer and a songwriter, when you dance with the music means that you have to dance with the music and the system and to having other people having the opportunity to listen to your music, and sometimes remixes can help that. And it took me a little time to understand that. But I remember [until today] when I first heard the version of "Tanto Tempo" from Peter Kruder, and I was like, 'Wow!' It blew my mind. I was like, 'Wow! This is so cool, so cool.' Completely flipped it. Yeah, sure. Yeah, totally flipped it. And, you know, he did some craziness with my voice. He totally changed everything, and he made it into another art. And, for me, that was the main thing. I was really, really happy just to see that that could be possible. Sometimes it works; sometimes it doesn't but in general, it's good to give the song some room and see what else turns up and that kind of thing. Yeah, why not, you know. It's like a new world, but we have to sometimes try it. So, you're in between tours now. You have a bunch of European festival dates coming up in August. Yes. What have you, other than getting your health together, getting your foot healed and all that, what have you been up to since the tour ended and up until the European stuff kicks off next month? Well, to tell you the truth, I've been out most of the nights. OK, that's fun. Nothing wrong with that. Yeah. I've been hanging with my friends and, you know, and the guys from Brazilian Girls. And there is, you know, the whole Nublu scene. Oh, sure, sure. Yeah. Yeah, and there was the fifth anniversary, so there was an artist from Brazil named Otto here that I participated on a project with him. We were in the studio yesterday. So there's been a lot of going out on the town New York style and a lot of me sleeping and not believing that I've been through everything that I have been through. Got you. A well-deserved break and time to have a little bit of fun. Well, Bebel, thank you very much taking the time to chat with us. We really appreciate it. My pleasure. I'm glad that you've got the ears for me. Of course. And we look forward to seeing you the next time you come through the San Francisco area. For sure. I'll be there soon. Well, thanks again. Take care. Bye bye. Take, Bebel. Bye bye.