You probably already know the story of how the musician from Minas Gerais Lô Borges influenced the sixth album of Arctic monkeysreleased in 2018, with a song from the legendary “tennis record”, from the time of Clube da Esquina in the early 1970s.
But this is far from the only time that Alex Turner – one of the biggest names in British Rock – sought inspiration in Brazil, and not only in our popular music but also in the history of our country.
In an interview with the portal Entertainment In 2022, the leader of the Monkeys recalled one of his first musical memories, which was when his father played a song by the legendary American singer Frank Sinatratalking precisely about the Brazilian tradition of growing coffee (via Far Out):
My father was a science teacher when I was born, but at that time he stopped teaching physics and started teaching music. He played in swing bands and stuff, so that was his thing. And the song I remember asking him to play when I was really little was [Frank] Sinatra singing a song about how ‘there’s a lot of coffee in Brazil.’
The song about Brazil that marked Alex Turner
The track in question is called “The Coffee Song”was written by Bob Hilliard It is Dick Miles and recorded by Sinatra for the first time in 1946, and later a new version was very successful when included on the album Ring-a-Ding-Ding!from 1961.
The song plays with the absurd quantities of grain that Brazil plants and exports and also our habit of consuming it daily here, saying that supposedly “there is no other drink” around here.
You can check out the full lyrics translated into Portuguese below, and also listen to them in the player below. You can understand why she had such an impact on Alex Turner as a child, right?!
O TMDQA! also recently prepared this complete guide with Alex Turner’s singer’s biggest influences, from Rock giants like David Bowieyou Beatles and the Beach Boyseven less obvious names like Patsy Cline, Leon Russell It is Leonard Cohen.
Continues after video
READ ALSO: Will it be? See the Spotify profile that would be Alex Turner and has playlists with Brazilian music
Lyrics to “The Coffee Song” by Frank Sinatra
There among Brazilians
Coffee beans grow by the billions
So they have to find extra cups to fill
They have an absurd amount of coffee in Brazil
You won’t find cherry soda
Because they have to fill the quota
And the way things are going, I bet they’ll never make it
They have a zillion tons of coffee in Brazil
No tea or tomato juice
You won’t see potato juice
Because all the planters in Santos say no, no, no
A politician’s daughter
She was accused of drinking water
And was fined the large sum of fifty dollars
They have an absurd amount of coffee in Brazil
You go out with a girl and then you find out
That she smells like a colander
Its perfume was made in the grain roaster
They would be able to drain the ocean in Brazil
And when ham and eggs need flavor
Coffee ketchup gives them a taste
Coffee pickles sold more than parsley
Why do they put coffee in the cafe in Brazil?
So you go to the local night
Serving coffee with donut
Dipping into coffee doesn’t require much skill
They have an absurd amount of coffee
Man, they have a lot of coffee in Brazil
