We Speak Music
Muca & Celeste release ‘Like This Before’ with added Roberto Menescal
Muca’s first collaboration with Menescal was 2021’s ‘Until We Meet Again’ which featured Alice SK on vocals. The track received incredible feedback from the likes of Songwriting Magazine & Songlines Magazine and BBC airplay with an interview with Robert Elms. The song has now reached over 1 million streams worldwide, so it feels like the right time for Muca to follow it up with new Menescal collaboration, ‘Like This Before’.
‘Like This Before’ has a modern and lively approach that pays homage to its Brazilian roots and the Bossa Nova style. The combination of the infamous acoustic guitar style of one of the only remaining living legends and pioneers of Bossa Nova, Roberto Menescal and Celeste Caramanna’s soft and sumptuous vocals is like honey on the ears and the collaboration shows how a sixty-year-old genre is still so special and still resonates with both old & young minds. The groove from Roberto’s guitar work sits beautifully behind the melody, with Muca’s fine skill of fusing the old and new wrapping the track up into quite a unique piece of music.
Muca specifically flew to Rio to record the track with Menescal. Once the recordings were done, Muca handpicked the right singer for the song. The only name that came to mind for this song was Celeste. Making the decision was easy; Muca saw Celeste for the first time on the same night he first met Menescal at Pizza Live Express Live in London. Celeste appeared with Menescal and sang a track with him that night. Both Menescal & Muca agreed that she would be the best vocalist for this track. Celeste then worked on the lyrics and recorded the vocals with Muca in London.
About the song and the experience, Celeste explains, ‘It’s simply amazing, unbelievable… because Roberto Menescal is a reference for everyone, he’s a piece of history… and I feel a lot of respect, admiration and gratefulness for what he’s done… he’s part of something that became very important in my life… it’s incredible for me to think of myself working with him, I couldn’t ever expect that to happen one day’.
Returning to the experience of recording with Menescal and what comes next, Muca says: ‘These couple of tracks I recorded were a game changer for me, and the experience of recording with Menescal was one of the strongest music experiences I’ve ever had. And because of that, I couldn’t stop thinking of inviting him to record an album together, which he not only accepted but said he was really happy to do so. I can’t believe that it is happening.’
Murillo Sguillaro, better known as Muca, is a Brazilian musician and producer living in London. He has built a modest following that looks set to explode once his new musical adventures unfold in the coming months and ‘Like This Before’ is just the beginning. Prepare to be transported somewhere beyond Ipanema Beach and London Fields on a bright sunny day!
In an era where overproduction and surface-level lyrics often dominate the music landscape, Toronto Tapes arrives like a breath of crisp Canadian winter air—raw, bracing, and honest to the bone. After years lost in personal turmoil, Zweng returns with a collection that fuses familiar melodies with unflinching self-exploration. It’s not often a cover album hits this hard, but Zweng isn’t just revisiting the past—he’s rewriting it.
Crafted during a year of sobriety and isolation in Toronto, the album was recorded at Kensington Sound Studios under the deft guidance of producer Will Schollar. Every sonic choice feels deliberate, from the ghostly reverb of Pet Sematary to the tender vulnerability of Jeanette. Zweng’s voice is both weathered and warm, like a lighthouse for the lost—rough enough to believe, melodic enough to stay with you.
The album’s strength lies in its duality: familiar songs presented with unfamiliar emotions. Back on the Chain Gang doesn’t just mourn love—it processes memory. Elevation isn’t a high—it’s a hymn to healing. And Take On Me, in Zweng’s hands, sheds its synth-pop skin to become a raw plea to be seen in one’s darkest moments. The songs are transformed, and in the process, so is Zweng.
But it’s the original compositions that truly anchor this emotional journey. Marianne and Jeanette delve into generational pain and maternal longing with the kind of lyrical intimacy that recalls early Elliott Smith or Jeff Buckley. These aren’t just songs—they’re emotional archeology, digging through family histories to find fragments of truth, and maybe a bit of peace.
The closer, Changes, doesn’t land like a neat resolution. Instead, it feels like an open door—a choice to keep evolving, one breath at a time. Zweng’s cover of Ozzy’s classic trades bravado for resignation, and in doing so, becomes the album’s thesis: we don’t become new people overnight. We change, painfully, slowly, and often without fanfare.
Toronto Tapes is less a comeback and more a coming home. It’s a vulnerable, gutsy, and beautifully fractured piece of work that insists on authenticity over perfection. For those in the midst of their own reckoning, Zweng’s voice may be the companion they didn’t know they needed.
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