Back in 2007, Ugly Betty was showing regularly on British television, on this channel called E4. I think its acquisition was a big thing for that place ’cause it was one of the first times that a programme’s episodes would be coming out simultaneously in the US and the UK. But anyways, ‘Solta o Frango’ was used in some adverts promoting Ugly Betty. I thought one of them would be up on YouTube or something to prove my point, but alas there doesn’t seem to be. I didn’t know what the song was at the time. But then the video for it showed up on MTV2 one day. Now I had a band and song name to link to the music. I remember one time my cousin was talking to my sister on the phone, mentioning that she liked the music that played in those adverts too and wanted to know what it was. When I told her the info she wanted to know, she was really surprised for some reason. But I guess I was 11 or 12, and kids at that age usually would have no idea about anything in general.

‘Solta o Frango’ is sung in Portuguese because Bonde do Rolê are from Brazil, you see. The young me witnessing the video for the first time was like, “Oh, so they’re a bit like CSS.” They’re not like CSS, though. The only thing similar about the two groups is that they both hail from the same country. I can try and sing along to the track. Usually I do. But I know I’m getting the pronunciation all wrong, except for those ‘Rolê’ calls during the chorus. From what I’ve gathered by translating the lyrics online, the track is meant to be a kind of theme song and a number telling the listener how cool it is to be in the band, that they’re a band who accept fans from all walks of life – there may be a mention of trans people in there – and the raucous chorus is a celebration and a call to everyone to let loose by ‘releasing the chickens’. The song is the second one on their debut With Lasers album, and until writing this post, I didn’t know that it was also produced by Diplo.

FIFA 08 came out in the autumn of 2007. I would have been about a month in to my second year of secondary school. Year 8. Whatever the equivalent of that is in the US. The local Woolworth’s store was down the road and my aim was to get that new FIFA game. I did, eventually. As always the soundtrack didn’t disappoint. And lo and behold, ‘Solta o Frango’ was on there. I didn’t realise it until way later, but it had been censored on the game. Some of the lyrics and been altered and spliced around a bit. If the translated English lyrics I see are correct, then the Portuguese words for ‘sluts’, ‘lesbians’ and ‘transvestites’ were probably taken out. Though you may have to tell me, I’ll link the clean version below. Lots of weekends were spent playing that game. Those were good times. Coincidentally, CSS were on the soundtrack too. Lot of love for Brazil from EA Sports on that edition.