This is my first effort from my project, Surfer Grrrls Brazil, during which I travelled up the coast of Brazil, meeting other girl surfers and musicians, surfing my heart out, and and creating original raps to celebrate my adventures and inspire other girls and women to live their own. (check out www.surfergrrrls.com) I made three music videos, one from the one from Rio de Janeiro, one from Bahia, and this one from the south of Brazil, featuring surfer grrrls from Florianopolis, Parana, and São Sebastão.
I wrote the words to this song with my friend Dani, an inspiring skater grrrl, philosopher, teacher, and mom. Dani and I had a tradition of meeting up at night, after her kids had gone to bed, to go skating on one of the best hills on the island of Florianopolis. Out of these sessions, we began putting down some verses about our love of surfing and skating. The music video features many of my first surfer grrrl friends in Brazil, footage of the first ever all girls surf contest in Brazil, and my very first beat using Logic Pro.
lyrics
We’re Attached to our boards
Like umbilical cords
Charging waves like mongol hordes, like matadors, like
Young lords you better draw your swords.
Cuz on Sundays with fun waves, we run straight to corners with surf boards and thumbs raised.
We done crazy! I like my days wavey, like my waves with gravy, You might try to save me, I aint gonna trade see, not even maybe, I'm a surf baby!
Ela era assím,
subia descia
sorria pra mim
queria podia
coria caia
ia até o fim
coria caia
ia até o fim
o mar e as ondase
as flores e o canto
o verso e o pranto
a ventania nos cantos
e amor e os anjos
City nights, city lights, got my heart tight
Mind's like give me five and I can get right.
Between carlights and barlights there's starlight.
Get on board our boards, and we can take flight
Kick flip, drop dip, stick it, oh that felt nice.
Surf streets under streetlights and keep the curves tight.
We know something and they don't understand it
Feeling that I get when I kick flip and land it
On the board, oh lord, the first time I stand up,
Make my first drop and my universe expanded.
Ela era assím,
subia descia
sorria pra mim
queria podia
coria caia
ia até o fim
coria caia
ia até o fim
a sintonia naturaleza
o movimento da beleza
forca e delicadeza
coragem e destreza
ela era assím
I push over the ledge, now I’m over the edge. Its life as I know it, I better not blow it, the wave shows its face to me, puts me in my place, but it’s Ok, cuz it's the place to be.
On the shining blue sea, where the river runs free, and you and me are free to be you and me.
I gotta hop to it, pop, make the drop into it, don't stop, just do it, don't think, intuit, like kids do it, let your legs carry you through it.
Before you know it you'll be flying down fluid,
And forgetting your life as you knew it.
Ela era assim,
subia descia
sorria pra mim
queria podia
coria caia
ia ate o fim
coria caia
ia ate o fim
credits
from Surfer Grrrls Brazil,
released October 11, 2014
Produced by Mira Manickam
English verses by Mira Manickam
Portuguese verses by Danielle Antunes
Drum sample by Ca'roll Steiner
Poem on video by Alice
¡Mira Manic! I am Mira ¡Mira Mira! Looking at the world with eyes wide open. Manic, gulping up life with a ravenous
hunger. Honoring Manickam, the dazzling gem inside the head of a cobra, who could hunt at night by it's sparkling light, the name of my ancestors. 6 foot tall, nature-nerd, surfer, ninja, educator, author, ethnically complicated, M.C. Rooted in Oakland by way of Jerzzy....more