Rio de Janeiro, BR · Brazilian pop-funk

Ana Frango Elétrico

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Rio's disco-funk polymath — boogie basslines, tropical glam, and a crate-digger's command of Brazilian pop history reassembled into something completely current.

Ana Frango Elétrico is the project of Ana Faria Fainguelernt, born in Rio de Janeiro in December 1997. The stage name, meaning Electric Chicken, was a nickname passed down from a grandfather whose Russian surname classmates struggled to pronounce. Fainguelernt is non-binary and pansexual, and has spoken of using music as a way to express gender.

Fainguelernt started guitar lessons at age ten and grew up listening to bossa nova and Tropicália figures such as Jorge Ben Jor, Caetano Veloso, Itamar Assumpção and Novos Baianos, alongside Prince, Michael Jackson and Everything but the Girl. In high school a band called Almoço Nu, named after the Portuguese title of Naked Lunch, mixed rock with maracatu and cumbia.

The albums move between skeletal art-pop and full-band funk, with sung-spoken vocals, wandering basslines and horn and string arrangements that nod to 1970s Brazilian records without imitating them. The 2018 debut Mormaço Queima was followed by Little Electric Chicken Heart in 2019, which drew a Latin Grammy nomination, and Me Chama de Gato Que Eu Sou Sua in 2023.

Beyond their own records, Fainguelernt has produced albums for other Rio artists, including Sophia Chablau e Uma Enorme Perda de Tempo and Bala Desejo. They have also published a book collecting poetry and illustrations made between 2015 and 2019, some of which supplied lyrics for their own songs. Live, the material tends to be looser and more groove-driven than on record.

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Brazilian pop-funk