DJ Marlboro

Fernando Luiz Mattos da Matta, better known as DJ Marlboro, is a Brazilian DJ.

DJ Marlboro is one of the originators of the Brazilian "funk" music, which is how a crossover between freestyle and rap music genres is known in Brazil. His first LP, Funk Brasil (1989), marks the beginning of the Brazilian "funk" movement, initially with versions of rap and freestyle hits from American artists, especially the 2 Live Crew ("Do Wah Diddy" became "Melô da Mulher Feia" and "One and One" became "Melô dos Números"), sung in Portuguese.

He got the idea of making Portuguese versions of American songs by paying attention to how people at parties that played freestyle music in Rio de Janeiro, known as "baile funk," would create and sing their own versions of the songs, in Portuguese, as they couldn't understand English, and how they would nickname the songs as "melô do..." ("the ... song"), since the original name of the songs, in English, was too difficult for them to pronounce and memorize. The best example is his first song, "Melô da Mulher Feia" ("song of the ugly woman"), which was how patrons of the "baile funk" would call the 2 Live Crew's version of "Do Wah Diddy," as they would sing along "mulher feia chupa o ... e dá o ..." ("ugly woman sucks ... and gives ...") to the 2 Live Crew's tune. He then made a PG version of the song and recorded it, and was a smash hit on the radio, prompting him to create more songs and record his first album. Later on, Marlboro and others started writing their own songs, and he released several albums.

He used to live in a district of the Rio de Janeiro city that was very distant, nicknamed "Marlboro Country" by his peers, who started calling him "Marlboro," and the nickname stuck.

DJ Marlboro is the host and producer of the radio show "Big Mix in Rio". DJ Marlboro was introduced to a worldwide audience In 2004 when German journalist, record label owner and fellow DJ, Daniel Haaksman formed Man Recordings and recruited both DJ Marlboro and Edu-K and DJ Marlboro - creating a link between South American and European artists.

DJ Marlboro credits the resurgence of funk fever in Brazil to the cyclical nature of musical fads, saying in his 23 years as a DJ, he's witnessed the funk explosion several times. Brazilian bailes, well attended dance parties that played American soul, disco, and funk music, featured heavy bass sounds and light systems. DJ Marlboro’s Portuguese rapping in his 1989 LP “Funk Brazil” helped introduce Portuguese music into these bailes, where the heavy bass sounds became a platform for this new sound. As a result, by the mid-1990s most of the music played by funk DJs was produced in Brazil. Currently, DJ Marlboro is the resident DJ at São Paulo's Lov.e Club.

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