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On the wall enclosing the ruins, there is a laminated sheet of paper with a text in German and a few drawn kittens. There is a whole invisible class of enlightened foreigners living in Italy. From their windows, they probably watch the chaotic traffic, witness the succession of ineffective governments, cursing the Italian barbarism but hopelessly in love with something that is here and nowhere else.
In their homes, they marry spaghetti with long coffee, antique furniture with Wedgwood ceramics and patchwork bedspreads – or colored glass Tiffany lampshades – with Valentino intimates or Bulgari jewelry, while our Renaissance sun yellows their incomprehensible books. They must feel a sense of alienation, living like this between a personal past from which they have always been distancing themselves and a present that is not really theirs yet. Not here and not there, halfway between an unchangeable, deeply-rooted past and a future that might see the global village prevail over parochialisms, is also this beautiful mélange, one of the most listenable contaminations of Real World artists.
The seams of this musical Frankenstein are hidden, and each member retains their original prerogatives intact. From Ireland, the bagpipes bring lyricism, the jigs bring camaraderie, the harp brings enchantment, the fiddle brings nostalgia. From Africa, the percussion brings enthusiasm, the voices bring instinct, the talking drums bring dignity, and the winds bring mystery. The master of ceremonies is a very prominent rhythm section, which flaunts an instinctive knowledge of trance rhythms to involve everyone. The encounter soon turns into a celebration, sometimes nostalgic ("Saor"), sometimes lively ("Whirl-y-reel"), but always - and sometimes wildly ("News from Nowhere") - pop.
In this imagined planet, one of many in the galaxy of world trance, I feel foreign, displaced, but more human.
I will leave the Kitekat in the meadow, next to the wooden mask fountain. We Italians too must contribute to the well-being of our strays, signs of life from multi-ethnic friendships.
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