24 Grana
Ghostwriters

Hello Francè, hello cardillo. You are well, I know. I found you well and heard you well in this Ghostwriters, the latest from 24 Grana. You sing again the way I like, but with more awareness. You still say those things in that way that moves me so much but with more consciousness, which is what really matters in life: getting emotional. The guitars are in shape, tell Peppe. It’s still you guys, more mature, more sincere, more 'Underpop' than ever. It’s still you guys: miraculous for my mood and for my long days, ghostwriters of many small stories, of many silent souls that dream and hope with you in their minds, but with your thoughts.

I saw how much of Rome you brought with you for the new album. There's Marina Rei, perfect in the backing vocals of 'Smania 'E Cagnà', always an excellent confirmation, Filippo Gatti, former Elettrojoyce in 'Le Verità', quite a surprise for those, like me, who got hurt by Elettrojoyce a few years ago; there's Riccardo and Daniele Sinigallia, Riccardo on vocals in the very first single 'Avere Una Vita Davanti' with almost Sanremo-like atmospheres and Daniele on the mixing and artistic production. Then you recorded the album here, right? So it's no coincidence that you're presenting it on Friday at Strike in Portonaccio. Too bad not to be there. Fresh unmissable commitments. I have to go 'Luntano', as you say at the beginning of the album, in the first track. 'Luntano pe' capì, chello che cerco nun se sà... dimane ce penso'. I'll tell you later. By the way, great track 'Luntano': overwhelming, direct, engaging. As soon as I heard it, it immediately conquered me. Like 'L'Alba' for the rest, touching. How beautiful you are Francè when you say that sometimes even a window can comfort you by watching what remains of a day fading slowly. You know that's what I did yesterday. I pampered myself a bit with you, with your melancholic voice, subtly resigned. With your guitars more and more intense and lonely. With your singing that over the years, let me say, has become more poignant, more sentimental, more mature. At times I hear from afar the passion of the old Neapolitan song. That resignation, that heartache that fills the heart the head and the days. Naples is always there with you, inside you and don't I feel it? Obscured and softened like the reverberations of the sun, in the reflections on the 'painted' houses of 'L'Alba', in the sadness of 'Lacreme' and its desire for redemption and revolution; you perceive it transient and hidden in 'Accireme', splendid, my favorite piece in this journey among winged ghosts without identity, with that faint harmonica and your singing that smells like spring or you discover it among the bitter words of 'Carcere', in a story that reeks of violence, misery, death.

I'm telling you, it's the first time I hear you like this; free almost light. Yes, there's always that unspoken and stifled melancholy but the turn, the one that could be felt in Underpop, is clear this time. There's no longer the gloom and darkness of the beginnings, there's only so much 'smania e cagnà'. The heaviness of the soul, the murky struggling of the words, like the atmospheres, has given way to cellos and violins, harmonicas and percussions, to lyrics and carefully arranged pieces that for intensity incredibly shine, caressing you inside. Few synths, little electronic. Little but well chosen.

And then Francè, that immediacy, that naturalness that shines through, the clean sound of 'Sbaglio 'E Parole', of 'Le Verità'. The freshness in knowing how to paint so well every story, every feeling, every beat in 30 minutes or a little more. You don't get the words wrong, no. When Ghostwriters ended, I was left so suspended, hesitant, I admit. With the desire still on my lips and the unfulfilled longing roaming in my head. Say it, you did it on purpose. Say it that Ghostwriters is so short for this reason, that it is so fleeting because only in this way, afterwards, you can’t wait to put it back in the player to make it play again and again and again. You know, short things are the most intense and the deep ones the most enduring.

A handful of crumbs Francè. Of sound crumbs made into music and veiled with singer-songwriter rock you've given us this time. Intimate, free, beautiful like 'nu cardillo'. For those who want to fly a little. For those who know how to wait. Wait for spring to be.