Afterhours
I milanesi ammazzano il sabato

A complex album like "I milanesi ammazzano il sabato" deserves many listens and a bit of reflection to reconnect the threads of the many themes (both thematic and musical) that compose it.

In just 43 minutes, Afterhours pack 14 songs, all intense, with no dead or filler moments.

Compared to the previous two records, the focus shifts from "what is not there" to what fills the author's life: the "little hyena" has become a "muse of no one," mother of a little girl. This is the thematic pivot of the album, which opens with conception ("Naufragio sull'isola del tesoro," which starts as a children's lullaby and has an almost "symphonic" development) and closes with a lullaby ("Orchi e streghe sono soli," which, conversely, begins as a rock ballad and ends as a nursery rhyme).

The music also marks a clear break from more recent works by Afterhours: the "dense," melancholic and monotonous mood gives way to more varied sounds, ranging from acoustic ballads to punk and hard-rock rhythms, even including some loops distantly descended from new-wave and a few soul splashes. Manuel Agnelli's voice also refrains from taking center stage in all its power and instead serves the pieces with versatility: now seductive, now ironic, now heartrending.

The "sentimental" theme (in the broadest sense) interweaves with other reflections: "Neppure carne da cannone per Dio" is the reassertion of the value of true art, not induced or created by the market, to the rhythm of a furious punk (with a chorus in 7/4). The "Tarantella all'inazione" is a brilliant oxymoron, the perfect blend of the most engaging dance and the absence of movement: to the rhythm of a slightly distorted taranta influenced by guitars, Agnelli's voice recites the text, rather than sings it, for much of the time. "Pochi istanti nella lavatrice" describes with sharp irony a couple's quarrel, in a two-time rhythm, another offspring of punk, mixing hard-rock and soul sounds (in the chorus) with a vaguely early '70s flavor.

Then there's the title-track, "I milanesi ammazzano il sabato": a beautiful poem set to music in the form of an acoustic ballad. It lasts only 2 minutes and 15 seconds but is worth the album's price.

"Riprendere Berlino" is the most catchy track on the record: simple melody, immediate riff and a "flirting" rhythm, with a snare drum beating in lift. "Tutti gli uomini del presidente" plays at parodying hard rock with semi-falsetto singing. The atmosphere changes distinctly with the intense "Musa di nessuno," a ballad tainted by various distortions.

Irony returns in the description of Milan besieged by the "maglioncini degli insorti" of "Tema: la mia città," another almost-punk almost-danceable tune with a recorder providing a mocking counter-melody to the chorus, and in the crooked rock 'n roll of "È dura essere Silvan," an apology for the struggle to maintain one's image, always the same as itself, "with a toupee in the heart."

The final songs conclude the sentimental discourse: the beautiful "Dove si va da qui" is about disorientation, the lack of common goals, with an arrangement halfway between Battisti's minimalist nineties and Sigur Ros; "Tutto domani" is already the reflection after "I've stopped thinking about you" over USA-styled rock sounds.

In short, "I milanesi..." is a good record that certainly deserves more than one listen, and that offers quality music: a rare commodity these days, at least on a mainstream level.