José Mário Branco was born in Porto, the son of primary school teachers, and became politically involved in the early 1960s. This political activity during the dictatorship in Portugal and his opposition to the colonial war led him to seek exile in France in 1963. There he would eventually meet and collaborate with musicians such as Sérgio Godinho and Zeca Afonso, whose records he produced and recorded at the Château d'Hérouville studios.