Last Night: Seu Jorge Paid Tribute to Wes Anderson as Well as David Bowie

The Brazilian musician remembered and recreated his role in Anderson's "A Life Aquatic" at the Civic Tuesday.

[Thanks to photographer Steven Hadley for the photos and review.]

Seu Jorge brought his A Life Aquatic: A Tribute to David Bowie tour to the Civic Theater Tuesday night. The show was a story telling event as Jorge embodied Pelé dos Santos, his role in the movie, while giving the audience insights into how he came to act and sing his own versions of Bowie songs in Wes Anderson’s classic The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou. Contrary to popular belief, he was not discovered on set playing Bowie tracks in between takes. He was hunted out by Anderson to contribute to the movie’s soundtrack and to perform several Bowie classics in Portuguese. As far as Bowie knew, his songs had never been covered in such a manner and "had Seu Jorge not recorded my songs in Portuguese I would never have heard this new level of beauty which he has imbued them with." 

After Bowie’s death, it was just a matter of time for Jorge to dawn the Team Zissou uniform and go on tour. Almost a year later, Jorge made his way to New Orleans, and if you have ever seen the iconic stills of Pelé with his acoustic guitar sitting on the boat, you would have a blueprint of what Jorge’s show would look like. When approached to do the tour, an idea was floated around to have the show backdropped in psychedelic colors and themes. Jorge squashed the idea and opted for a more simple presentation with minimal, effective, practical lights. During the encore of “Queen Bitch” that accompanied the movie’s end credit sequence, he was also backed by scenes from the movie.    

The show itself couldn’t have been any more perfect. Knowing the soundtrack, and not knowing the language at all lent to several “Ah, that’s what song he’s playing” moments.  As expected, the audience reacted most enthusiastically to “Ziggy,” “Changes,” “Space Oddity,” “Rebel Rebel,” and “Life on Mars.”  While I really enjoyed those, my personal highlights were “Suffragette City” and “Oh! You Pretty Things.” Bowie may be gone, but Sue Jorge has found an amazing way to keep his spirit alive.  

The setlist and an extended gallery of photos from the show.