Mateus Mondini

Mateus Mondini, a.k.a 'Maradona' is the best thing to happen to band photography since Glenn E. Friedman, and the best current documentalist of the DIY hardcore punk scene. This interview was done for Vice Magazine, but it was not to their liking and thus rejected, and I didn't really feel like letting it rot forever. Granted, I could have gone back and added a few less stupid questions to it, but I really did not feel like taking up more of Mateus' precious time. No I did not ask him about Sarcófago or Regina Do Santos, but hey, you can't always win.

Brazil seems to be a very dangerous country..aren't you scared of carrying all your equipment around to dirty punk shows in sketchy places? or do you have a private escort like some people do out there?

I would love to have a body guard if he is a chimpanzee or a gorilla, but we are not that wild, even living in São Paulo I never had a lot of problem with thieves but of course I’m scared walking everywhere with my only equipament in the backpack, so I did a insurance of it all and now I can walk with the camera everywhere without fear.



My friend Pablo asks if you've ever been beat up for being in the pit taking up space and getting in everybody's way while they're trying to have some fun..

Beat up never, but spits, bubblegum sometimes, I used to have a lot of problens with cider in London, but it use to happening in big shows where im working in the front of the fans crushed in the grill, im punk shows I already had problens with broken equipament, flash, lenses, glasses, camera, well, everything, but it’s the result of someone stage dive, pogo or even my fault, I don’t think someone broke my stuff for evil, always it happened I think was one accident, in a punk show I..m there to have fun too, so I do the pogo, singing, Im just one more in the crowd, It's a little more boring to be with the camera but…




Please tell us about 'Fodido E Xerocado', the book you and your partner in crime Daigo have produced..

It’s a fanzine with just photos of punk(or related) bands that was taken by me and my friend Diago, inside a silk screened envelop, its free and its used to be 100-200 each edition that goes out every 2 or 3 months, we are working in number 11 now and we start it because our photos was just in internet and we wanted something that you can hold and carry to toilet. Two years ago our friend Thiago released one better looking volume with some colour photos but it still not a book, maybe one day.
Daigo is nice, one of my best friends and one of the best journalist photographers of today, very talented, dedicated, organized and can fucked up any amazing band with a bad taste tattoo in his arm as one "Everything went Black" with a baby hand, or a Embrace word game

In my country, Brazil is famous for producing excellent shemales, myth or truth? are there or have there ever been trannies in the Brazilian hcpunk scene?

Yeah transvestites are one of the biggest brazilian exports, I don’t know any punk travesti today but have some historys about a punk gang from the early 80s called Punk Dolls, the old punks always refer to they as “punks travestis” but I don’t know if they were more to New York Dolls or to Wayne County, anyway they were always involved in fights had one show that someone put fire in their hair and the venue was taken by the smell of burnt hair.



You've travelled all over Europe photographing tons of bands and scene celebrities, i'm sure this has produced embarassing stories you can now tell to millions of readers...right? is it true that Invasión/Destino Final have an art director that coreographs their poses and sprays the room with hairspray every three minutes?

During a show in sweden after the singer of Clorox Girls was doing a lot of sieg heiling while naked and also wearing a pink cowboy hat, he commanded for everyone else to be naked, after it he was almost arrested for lighting cigaretttes and placing them in everyone's mouths (still while naked) since smoking indoors is illegal in Sweden. With Press Gang was normal some members jerk off in the van while watching 80s porno movies.
In a festival, I entered in our room and see a couple of completely drunk crusties going out of my bed, I'm not sure what happened there but I prefered sleep in the sleeping bag that day.
Not so embarassing but uncomfortable was 4 days travelling across Austria, with 9 people in the van that just had seat for 3 people in the front and no seats or windows in the back, so were 4 days of long drives lying in the dark with 5 other people, more all the bags and gear, pissing in water bottles and trying to sleep the most possible.
haha, i don't think Invasion need it, they are a amazing band and very easy to photograph, Guille is the Gisele Bundchen of punk rock, any click and you have a good photo.



I recently saw the 'Botinada' documentary about the history of punk in Brazil, and there's this dude that lost his arm throwing a molotov cocktail at a rival gang and now has a fucking hook!!! i'm sure there are millions of amazing stories related to this living legend right??

well, nothing compared with the molotov and hook story, he isn't a guy that you see everyday but he appears in some shows, I remember a show that his band played, it was he singing and much younger guys playing, but he got very drunk before the show, so just the young guys played and he stayed drunk behind the stage, in other show, while a vegan straight edge band played he took the mic and start scream things like "fuck the cows, we have to eat the cows..." but nobody gave a lot of attention, in end 90s he directed one "Opera Punk" about the fights between punk gangs from São Paulo and ABC, and its all that i know.


Photos: Concentration Summer Camps, Gorilla Angreb, Masshysteri, Invasión.
http://www.flickr.com/mateuspatche