While resident in New York, London and Lisbon, Catarina was eager to develop a more electronic sounding album, and to explore various production techniques, from sampling to sound synthesis. She had in her mindset a new concept of spoken word, where melodies would freely invade the poems and infuse into them, to an almost song format. Breaking through conventions and styles, she assumes in this project her immigration experience and her own estrangement with her culture as a motif. The poems are „cultural artefacts” that mirror a practice of disidentification from the familiar. This practice marks the beginning of nomadic wisdom. Nomadism as critical consciousness that resists settling into socially coded modes of thought and behavior. Add collage infused structures, hip hop culture, jazz liberties and plenty of creativity as a live band. Breaking through. Mad Nomad are: Catarina dos Santos (vocals, compositions), Óscar Graça (keyboards/synths), Luís Candeias (drums), Bernardo Fesch (electric bass) and André Pinheiro aka Apache (sample programming). Mad Nomad’s second album, Common Ground, is out July 2026.
“Here is a band with full potential to mark their own original stance in the music world. “Untamed”is a fascinating album, for the ones who love exploratory music, producing and mixing, multicultural landscapes, and also a full respect for difference as a lead energy for the world to evolve. Catarina dos Santos shows us in this work why she is the creative, attemptive, and activist artist she is, and that her artistic universe deserves our continuous attention.”
António Branco, Ponto de Escuta, Jazz.pt
Catarina dos Santos | Singer and Composer 