Bouncing Souls continue to celebrate their 20th anniversary as they tour through South America. They've decided to offer us some Dispatches while on the road, the first of which we are pleased to present right now.
The band is two months into a year in which they plan on releasing one song per month.
We arrived in Sao Paulo, Brasil on one of our only days off on the tour. Cesar, super promoter, picked us up and brought us to a Brazilian BBQ place. Iâm a vegetarian but I was impressed. It was buffet style so they had a lot of vegetarian options. They also kept bringing out lots and lots of meat that they would slice on to your plate…all different kinds and as much as you could eat. Wow. The next day Cesar took the vegetarians to a great vegan place own by a punk rocker. It was great!
The show was the biggest of the tour and we met some amazing people from all over Brasil. It was truly incredible to see the connection music makes around the world. Its amazing to see how far one idea can go, and just not stop. Thanks everybody, especially all of the promoters on the tour who put their necks out just for the love of music and bringing it to the world.
Bryan writes:
Brazil was totally sick, absolutely badass. My first thoughts were of Gracie Brazilian Jiu Jitsu I wanted to take this opportunity to make some kind of pilgrimage to any one of the great camps in Sao Paolo. Well, I almost got my wish anyway. The first great thing that happened was the traditional Brazilian steak house our promoter Cesar took us to. Revenge of the meat-eaters! Pete and I being the only two omnivores on this particular tour usually end up going along on way too many vegan "ant brigade" missions across whatever town we're in, to some hippie joint serving tasteless non-food and leave feeling unsatisfied. Well, tonight, it was steaks on swords, every cut every way you can imagine. It was here that I asked Cesar about any fighting camps I might be able to train a little before tomorrow's show. He made a call to Leonardo, a Black Belt under Hocian Gracie here in Sao Paolo. Leo also sang for a prominent Brazilian hardcore band called "Street Bulldogs" and is pure badass from the cauliflower ears on down. Being a big Souls fan, he was more than happy to oblige and a plan was made for him and I to train the afternoon of the gig. As luck would have it, Leo is also a tattooer, so the plan was expanded into getting a souvineer tattoo as well. That turned into tattoos for four of us, but the plan remained for him and me to roll on the mats at his school afterword. We got an early start in the morning but still, 4 tattoos always takes longer than you think it will, and this part of the plan consumed all the time we had to work with. So thanks Leo for a badass tattoo, I look forward to learning some skills from you next time! The tattoos that Pete, Michael, DJ and I got are of a soccer ball (got mine on my foot, ouch!) and scrolls reading "South America 2009". The show was one of the best of the tour. Footage went up on YouTube the very next day thanks to all kids in the crowd shooting videos. Just go to Youtube and search something like "Bouncing Souls Brazil true believers" or something to get a feel. Thanks Cesar, Leo, and all of the Brazillian punk and hardcore scene, you rule!