Vinil do Mustafa is a treasure trove of 1970s Tropicalía music.
It ’s just after sundown on the first Saturday of the month in Rio de Janeiro , Brazil , and a crew of merrymaker are rolling intoVinil do Mustafarecord store , sweep up their fundament in Havaianas . Everyone ’s here — young people , old people , locals , foreigners , flower child , children , dog . Working the lazy Susan is Mustafa Baba - Aissa , a 53 - year - older Brazilian DJ who wears round glasses with thick frames , has an infective smile , and prefer to be cite to by only his first name . He ’s flap guest in while spinning a healthy mix of soulfulness , funk , and malarkey .
“ Music ’s been a love all my life , ” enjoin Mustafa , who started DJ - ing at the fresh age of 16 .
One might not expect a fête to follow in such tightlipped quarters , but in Rio , nothing ’s ever that serious . The event , which only happens once a calendar month , kicks off outdoors in the afternoon , as friends of the shop go around out on rickety beach chair , snack on empadinhas , and take in some sluttish head bopping . It ’s only a thing of time before everyone is belting lyric and spilling out of the crowded entryway that reads , So a cultura expulsa as coisas ruins das pessoas(“Only culture expel sorry things from people ” ) .
Tourists and locals gather at Vinil do Mustafa’s monthly dance party.|Photo by Maria Magdalena Arréllaga for Thrillist
Mustafa ’s record depot sits at the top of a hill overlooking the Santa Teresa locality . The tiny , depressed - slung shop , with its traces of colonial computer architecture , might not be marked by any official signage . But it ’s flooded with color — hand - painted with rainbow bull’s - heart and the truthful - to - living fig of samba legends Elza Soares and Clara Nunes . It ’s no surprisal the record storage has found a menage in Santa Teresa , a bohemian neighborhood famous for its artist . Some people say that to infer a urban center you must first empathize its night life . That make Vinil do Mustafa a must - visit .
Before Mustafa inhabited his current digs , he go on a shop nearby in the same neighborhood — a subterranean space that turned into an exclusive club every Thursday dark . After the pandemic , however , the owner “ wanted to see the sky . ” In his novel location , Mustafa boasts an impressive collection of everything you might anticipate , but he does n’t say no to the odd ‘ 90s pelvic girdle - record hop album or movie soundtrack . It ’s more authoritative for the owner to keep his compendium tight than to be picky about writing style . “ I do n’t desire to betray records in mass , ” he says . “ I do n’t require to have thousands of records , where you pace into the depot and you ca n’t find what you ’re looking for . ” alternatively , he carefully curates his choice , some of which he sells on the punk , though especially rare championship can institute in much more .
“ I ’m shoot for for all variety of gang , ” he say .
A local legend, Mustafa has been DJ-ing for 37 years.|Photo by Maria Magdalena Arréllaga for Thrillist
Although he ’s to begin with from Algeria , the record store possessor has spent 37 long time spin vinyls acrossParis , London , Detroit , and theCanary Islands . Rio , he says , was purely a matter of coincidence . “ I was play a social club in Paris and a Brazilian lady friend came up to me and order , ‘ Isle of Man , if you go to Brazil , multitude are pop off to be intimate what you do , ’ ” he says . “ I require a escape two days later , and I ’ve been here for 21 year . ”
That girl was correct . Vinil do Mustafa has become a unquestionable point of interestingness for locals and internationals likewise . And it ’s this mark of client that gives the store its communal spirit . Because when a tourist inevitably gets lost on the wind J. J. Hill leading up to the shop , it ’s likely a Carioca will ask , “ You await for Mustafa ? ” and take the air them there , just because .
The DJ does n’t buy his records online , nor does he sell them online . Because for him , it ’s all about the experience of walking into the store and allow room for find . When a customer shops at Vinil do Mustafa , a one - on - one mouthful seance with the owner ( and only employee ) is almost guaranteed .
Vinil do Mustafa boasts an impressive collection of 70s Brazilian records.|Photo by Maria Magdalena Arréllaga for Thrillist
“ Some people arrive with record book in mind , but a sight of people do n’t live what they ’re going to buy and call for me to show them material they do n’t screw , ” he excuse . “ They ’ll stay around two hr , and we ’ll take heed to a mountain of stuff and nonsense together . ” The only affair Mustafa will enquire of you is that you polish off your shoe at the door , so that you may take advantage of his plush carpet and cushions in the store .
Every now and again , a famous musician or DJ will drop by , driven by word of Mustafa ’s hoarded wealth trove . Canadian jazz ensembleBadBadNotGood , the proprietor recalls , was one of the most memorable . “ I opened the store for them for three night in a course because they were brainsick about the records , ” he enounce .
The allurement of Mustafa ’s computer memory concur with a reincarnate interest in Brazilian medicine , specifically Música Popular Brasileira , or MBP . “ There ’s a bounteous revival of ‘ 70s music from Brazil , ” Mustafa says . “ mass are happen upon it , not only in Brazil , but also alfresco of the state . ” An outgrowth of bossa nova — the sophisticated blend of jazz and samba we ’ve come to relate with “ The Girl from Ipanema ” ( 1964)—MBP sought to appeal to a wider audience with acoustic instrumentals and politically provocative lyrics .
This music genre embraced the Tropicalía cause , which sail through the art , film , theater , poetry — and most profoundly — euphony of late 1960s Brazil . In 1967 , the nation was under full military totalitarianism . Artists , seeking to recover a horse sense of ethnic indistinguishability , look to the body of work of modernist poet Oswald de Andrade who , in hisManifiesto Antropofágico , contend for feeding off of foreign influence to create something uniquely Brazilian .
When it amount to music , Tropicalía embraced Brazil ’s already diverse , regional sound — like the richly - pitched monkey howling created by the cuíca drum — and married them with highly strung genre found abroad , like rock ‘ n ’ peal and psychedelia . “ People started to listen to other euphony , peculiarly English sway like the Beatles and Gallic guy like Serge Gainsbourg , ” Mustafa excuse . “ And they pop to stick in electric guitars and other instruments that did not exist in Brazilian music . ” Musicians Caetano Veloso and Gilberto Gil were among the foremost proponents , farm the 1968 record album , Tropicália : ou Panis et Circencis , widely regarded as the movement ’s musical manifesto .
These days , one can take the air into any voguish natural wine bar in New York City and hear the tune of some jazz - electronic or nu - disco musician taste an MBP track , like Esbe ’s rendition of Jorge Ben Jor ’s “ Oba Lá Vem Ela ” ( 1970 ) in “ Darling ” ( 2015 ) ; or Poolside ’s 2017 remix of Evinha ’s “ Esperar Pra Ver ” ( 1971 ) . Even Mustafa ’s beloved BadBadNotGood receive Brazilian composer Arthur Verocai in their albumTalk Memory(2021 ) .
Meanwhile , Fernando Trueba and Javier Mariscal ’s animated docudramaThey Shot the Piano Playerpremiered just last month in the US . The plastic film follows an American diary keeper ( vocalise by Jeff Goldblum ) who travel to Rio to investigate the mysterious disappearance of Brazilian pianist Francisco Tenório Júnior in 1976 . The soundtrack features music by Veloso and Gil , as well as João Gilberto , Vinicius de Moraes , andPaulo Moura .
The film , which is presented in the vibrant colours characteristic of Tropicalismo nontextual matter , reflects the ways in which music run like a current through Rio . It ’s something Mustafa hopes to capture at his record book store parties , as he top the mere bartering of vinyl group . “ The store has to be alert , ” he says , about what revolutionise him to host . “ You have to feel the euphony . ”
On that first Saturday of the month , Mustafa shew that a great set is one that does n’t fall down dupe to a undivided musical style . Peppered throughout his lineup of classic Brazilian tracks , for instance , are a few outliers—“Da Funk ” by Daft Punk ; “ The Real Slim Shady ” by Eminem ; “ Miss You ” by the Rolling Stones — that are at once surprising and familiar . “ I ’m portion out something with hoi polloi . I can palpate it , and they can sense it . It ’s about an exchange : you and the bunch , ” he says .
The thing about Brazilians , Mustafa distinction , is that they sleep with to sing along — a phenomenon he has n’t quite experienced to the same extent DJ - ing in the other area he once called home . “ Even if it ’s in a different language , they wish the music , they learn the words , and they sing along , ” he says . “ It ’s just the way citizenry behave in Brazil . ”
For those who are look to get into ‘ 70s Brazilian medicine , Mustafa recommends " undisputed Billie Jean Moffitt King of individual and funk " Tim Maia , Gerson King Cumbo , Cassiano , and Marcos Valle , as well as musicians Robson George and Lincoln Olivetti , who despite only putting out one eponymous album , bring on a ton of popular music .
Perhaps the most remarkable thing about this stylus of medicine — which Mustafa would probably argue is well experienced against the backdrop of Pão de Açúcar — is that it ’s like an gross souvenir . Once you hear it in Rio , you ’ll get a line it everywhere else , too .
