Rusting machinery found on a scrapheap is at the heart of a vibrant revival of Brazil's music scene.
The equipment — vinyl printing presses dating from the 1950s — laid dormant and forgotten for almost 20 years until Sao Paulo musician and businessman Michel Nath found and refurbished them.
Now the presses are bringing back to life the irresistible sound of samba, bossa nova and Brazilian jazz, thanks to renewed interest in an old-school medium — vinyl.
"We are living a kind of renaissance of music [and] most of that has connection with the vinyl; with the legacy of the vinyl," Mr Nath says.
"For me, vinyl is more real, it's more alive."
Brazil used to be world-famous for its vinyl exports, but almost all the manufacturers shut down in the early 1990s.
Mr Nath's Vinil Brasil is the first new vinyl pressing plant to open in Brazil in two decades, and joins Rio de Janeiro's Polysom as the only manufacturers now operating in the country.
Mr Nath says he specifically wanted to revive a lost Brazilian industry, and end local musicians' reliance on offshore factories.
"Making Brazilian music in Brazil — it's something fundamental," he says.
"Somebody needed to do [this]. It's not for me, it's for the people, for the culture."
A golden age of sound
Sao Paulo band Samuca e a Selva is also at the forefront of Brazil's vinyl revival.
The 10-piece band plays a hybrid of Brazilian genres, combining MPB (Brazilian pop), funk, samba and Afro-beat to create a sound that harks back to a golden age of classic Brazilian artists of the 1960s and 1970s.
"There's a Brazilian music scene coming very, very, very strongly," lead singer Samuel Samuca says.
"We are rescuing old values of our music … trying to listen to the great masters of the past and do it in the present."
To pay homage to this musical legacy, the band decided they not only wanted to revive an old sound, they also wanted to resurrect an old medium.
So they pressed their latest album, Madurar, on Brazilian-made vinyl.
"The vinyl has got something, you know, it's pure music," Mr Samuca says.
"There's a thing: you can touch it, you can feel it, you can smell it. There's the little book inside with the lyrics … the whole experience to listen to a vinyl, it's different."
"An album, a vinyl, is a complete story. That's why we want to have ours."
After only one year of operation, Vinil Brasil has hit a number of milestones, including pressing the 34th album of iconic Brazilian singer Elza Soares, as well as manufacturing an album by Goiânia band Boogarins that caught the attention of the famous BBC DJ, Gilles Peterson.
Mr Nath says opening a new business in Brazil's current climate — particularly in an industry that hasn't operated in Sao Paulo for decades — has not been easy.
But he says the success of his vinyl factory is important to give people hope.
'We are fighting every day to keep this place alive'
Brazil has been gripped by an economic and political crisis for five years, enduring one of its worst recessions while simultaneously navigating through multiple high-profile political scandals.
"It's difficult to explain for people from outside — you need to come and live a little bit in Brazil and feel what people are living here. We are not living a nice moment," Mr Nath says.
"That is why it's important to make music and vinyl for the people. For giving education, for giving wisdom, for giving happiness, for giving hope.
"That's why we [are] fighting every day to keep this place alive in Brazil."
The public's rekindled love affair with vinyl records is a trend that has been playing out in many Western countries, including Australia, for almost a decade.
In the United States, vinyl sales now account for 11.2 per cent of all albums sold — a figure that has been growing for 12 straight years.
But in Brazil the trend is still nascent, despite the country's rich tradition of vinyl production and export.
Alfredo Bello, better known as DJ Tudo, is a Sao Paulo-based musician, producer, researcher and collector of music. His vinyl collection numbers about 20,000 discs, many of which were manufactured in Brazil.
For him, there is a fundamental connection between Brazilian music, vinyl production and the country's identity.
"Brazil was the fourth country on the planet to have a phonograph industry," he says.
"We lost the technology to do vinyls. It's really crazy … We really cut this knowledge about how to do vinyls."
Mr Bello was one of the first musicians to have his music pressed by Vinil Brasil — a small seven-inch run of his song Pra Iemanjá. Until this release, all of his previous albums had been manufactured in Europe.
"Brazilian music is part of our DNA. Our culture. Why we are Brazilian," he says.
"For us, it's important to preserve, to respect, to know this music and culture to be Brazilians.
"[Now] I will do all my vinyls in Brazil."
