'Tropical punk' Cibelle

Published on Friday 19 September 2008 09:51

EXPLODING with enthusiasm and giggling away like someone less than half her age, Brazilian-born Cibelle - that's pronounced see-bell-eee - is the epitome of your kookie singer-songwriter.

So it is no real surprise to discover that for her third, as yet unfinished album, one of the people she is already working with Bjork's musical director and in-demand programmer, Damian Taylor.

For the moment, however, she's out on tour promoting her latest single, White Hair. It follows in style from her second and most recent album The Shine of Dried Electric Leaves, released in 2007, which was co-produced by no less modern dignitaries of pop, Tunng's Mike Lindsay and Air's Yann Arnaud.

"White Hair is my anti-Botox hymn," she says. "One day, I would like to become an old lady with very long, long white hair and I hope I get there and I manage not to stick my face with Botox and all sorts of things. It is about aging gracefully. And being cool with it. Having shiny eyes, and lots of memories and having the lines, having the story of your life in your face and in your hands. I think the world is lacking that a bit."

Having grown up in Sao Paulo and now living in London Cibelle, who is more than happy to admit to her current age, ascribes to a style of music which she describes as "tropical punk".

"I am 30. People say I should lie, but I don't believe in that kind of stuff. I feel younger now than when I was 28," she says. "I am part of a group of artists, not just in music, we are all friends, and the general aesthetic of everything that we do, is tropical punk in a way.

"It is pretty punk in the attitude of not-conforming. Not with a dark aggression, but it is more in the extreme freedom of expression. It is in non-conforming, we don't conform with things. We just are into exploding and colours and that maybe is where the idea of punk comes from. It is 'tropical' as in hot in the head and the body and the expression and with the same kind of punky attitude.

When Cibelle arrives in the Voodoo Rooms on Sunday evening on her first ever visit to Scotland, expect creative playfulness, lots of instrumental experimentation and very sweet vocals from the woman who describes herself as a pioneer of Rick Castro's "Abravanista Movement".

"Abravanar – that means free yourself in exploding colours," she explains. "The first time I asked Ricky what he meant he said exploding colours. For me it means free yourself no matter what people think. Free yourself from being judgmental, free yourself from anything that might be damaging to you. It is being as free a human and creative person with your love and hoping it spreads to other people."

&#149 Cibelle, Voodoo Rooms, West Register Street, Sunday, 8pm, 12, 0131-556 7060