ronald fonseca/ agência o globo. the black-and-white makeup that marked the signature look of the group was chosen almost by chance. prior to the success of the secos & molhados, ney matogrosso had been an actor and, in a show by the group at the casa da badalação e tédio, a club next to the ruth escobar theatre, he arrived late, having come straight from a children's play in which he had been acting. in his haste, he took the stage still in full makeup. joão ricardo, founder and lead composer of the band, and bandmate gérson conrad were excited by the audience reaction and decided to adopt that style. that artifice was amplified by matogrosso's stage and television performances themselves. early in the 1970s, he had demanded a newly hegemonic role. in the article corpo e performance no experimentalismo do grupo secos & molhados (body and performance in the experimentalism of the group the secos & molhados), vargas describes the singer's posture with precision: “his figure is arrogant (bulging bare chest, head held high), even with bare feet. his eyes are wide open, the shrill voice is remarkable, the exaggerated movements of his mouth emphasize the pronunciation of the words, hip movements insinuate other codes, feathers, beads and sequins jangle with his body, a series of dance movements or completely free movements on the stage become codes for freedom. these weren’t rehearsed moves, that always stayed the same.” instead of driving away the public in a country that was still conservative, the effect was the opposite: sold-out shows all over brazil, a tour in mexico, hundreds of thousands of albums sold. “the two lps by the secos & molhados were perhaps the biggest phenomenon experienced by the brazilian recording industry in that period,” zan observes. “i think the experience of that group set new standards for the staging of songs at a time when television was coming into its own as the principal medium of mass communication in this country. at the same time, the performances anticipated the invention of the video clip, a new component of the language of popular music.”