Antônio Carlos & Jocafi return with JID026, a Jazz is Dead collaboration that reconnects the Bahian duo with the present while keeping their roots firmly intact. More than five decades into a career that began in Salvador at the tail end of the 1960s, they’re still finding new ways to move their sound forward, this time alongside Adrian Younge and Ali Shaheed Muhammad.

The connection came through Brazilian guitarist Beto Barreto, but once the introduction was made, the rest unfolded quickly. “The first time we met, it was like family,” the duo recalls. That sense of familiarity carried into sessions in Los Angeles, where ideas were kept loose and the recording process leaned into instinct. Songs took shape in real time, built from feel rather than formula, aligning naturally with the Jazz Is Dead approach.

That spontaneity mirrors how Antônio Carlos & Jocafi first made their mark. Their 1971 debut Muita Zorra! introduced a sound grounded in Bahia’s traditions but open to everything around it, from samba and MPB to funk’s rhythmic push. Out of that record came “Você Abusou,” a song that quickly took on a life of its own, recorded and reinterpreted across generations and cementing their place in Brazilian music.

Through the following decades, they carved out a catalog that never settled into one direction. Sacred and street-level influences sat side by side. Humor and social commentary moved through the same songs. Their writing reached artists like Clara Nunes, Gal Costa, Maria Creuza, and Sérgio Mendes, while their work in television and film further embedded their music into Brazil’s cultural fabric. Even as their audience expanded, their perspective stayed rooted in Salvador, shaped by its streets, markets, and spiritual traditions.

JID026 isn't reintorduciing Antônio Carlos & Jocafi so much as place them in a new setting that makes sense for where they’ve always been headed. They point to Younge’s deep connection to Brazilian music as a key factor, noting how closely he studies and absorbs its rhythms and history. That shared understanding keeps the album from feeling like a modern experiment. Instead, it plays as a natural extension, where Bahia’s folkloric elements meet analog soul without losing their identity.

The result lands somewhere between past and present, not as a retrospective, but as a continuation. Antônio Carlos & Jocafi have always worked in that space, pulling from tradition while staying open to what comes next. Jazz Is Dead 026 keeps that balance intact, carrying the sound of Bahia forward without sanding down what made it resonate in the first place.