Rio de Janeiro is a city that's famous for its music, but it's more commonly associated with samba, bossa nova, and pagode than with hip hop. Of the more modern styles of music, hip hop loses out in the city to the somewhat tinny, shouty sounds of favela funk (a musical style that has more in common with Miami Bass and Reggaeton than with funk as we know it in the West), but is now starting to carve a niche for itself in Rio.

Lapa is the heart of nocturnal Rio — Photo courtesy of Hello Kitae

Leading the charge for a hip hop revolution in Rio is Febarj, a dancing den located right in the heart of Lapa, Rio's unofficial party central, on a street just in front of the famous Lapa Arches.

An arts center during the working week, Febarj is one of Rio's liveliest hip hop clubs at weekends, with rap fans from across the city heading here on Friday and Saturday nights. Revelers pack the two floors of this colonial building and dance to a mainly US-based hip hop soundtrack. Entrance is free before midnight (R$6 after midnight), but things don't really get going until after 1 am, and dancers keep going until dawn.