Sávio Sordi

Sávio Sordi — Brazilian drummer — was Hibria's original drummer, between 1996 and 2005, and part of the line-up that recorded Defying the Rules (2004). That record is a landmark of Brazilian metal. Released by a band from Porto Alegre without major-label backing, it circulated internationally and opened the European and Japanese circuit to the group — a result almost no band from outside the Rio–São Paulo axis achieved at that moment. His function there carries a particular technical demand. Hibria does not play the power metal of continuous double kick: its tracks have changes of metre, irregular fills and riffs that abandon predictable structure, and the drums have to articulate those transitions rather than merely sustain speed. It is an approach closer to 1980s American metal than to the European school. Sordi covers the band's first decade, from the beginning in 1996 until after the release of the debut album — the period in which the identity Hibria would keep afterwards was formed.