Afoxé (ijexá)

Afoxé is the street form of the Candomblé ijexá rhythm, carried through Salvador's carnival by groups like Filhos de Gandhy and into pop by Gilberto Gil and Caetano Veloso. It is slow, rolling and in four, with no backbeat. The agogô bell plays x.x.xx.x (1, 2, 3, and-of-3, and-of-4) and the atabaques answer with open low tones on the ands of 2 and 4; a shaker (afoxé/xequerê) runs even eighths underneath. The bass walks a tresillo (1, and-of-2, 4) and the guitar strums with the bell, adding the two upstrokes that give the groove its sway. It is a relative of the bembé bell family but squared into duple time; hear it next to the 12/8 bell to feel the kinship.