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Rating: "You always say your prayers
Count to ten and
Pray again that
It's not up to you
To decide
Crying stuck on the ring road
Chasing a stupidity
It was splendid and golden
Fresh and poisoned
But the country to sink
All around you and dance
Swearing disdain
And laugh a little
And you want to do something that matters
And do it before your love is lost
Don't you realize that if you want it
What used to be worth is no longer worth
If they've told you to stay home
Fly low, don't bother
If you are contemptuous you can buy
If everything is worth nothing is worth
If you no longer know if you're a man
If you're afraid of making mistakes
If you just want to think
That spring is coming soon
Now do something that matters
That it's also for you if your country is crap
There's a road in the middle of nowhere
Full and empty of people
And it doesn't lead home
If you don't go there
I want to do something that matters
Telling the truth is an act of love
Done for our dying rage"
(Afterhours)
I want to immediately clarify a few things (not to "soften you up" when giving the rating to this "review", you know I don't care much about these little things, but for fairness towards all the DeBaserians who might lose precious minutes of their time reading my nonsense).
A) I am a longtime fan of the Afterhours, I have probably seen them in concert at least 50 times but unfortunately I can't stand their last three albums and I find that Agnelli (at least publicly) has become quite unpleasant in recent years.
B) I am writing this stuff in a stream of consciousness manner, so it might come out rather "confused".
C) "Il Paese è Reale" is a beautiful song to me.
What did cptgaio think when they learned that the Afterhours were going to Sanremo?
I reference an email, dated January 29, 2009, that I sent to my friends (also fans) upon learning the news (the email is real, I have witnesses...)
"For a few days it's been official, the Afterhours will participate in the next Sanremo festival (I spare you the various links, the news online is provided abundantly, just type in the keywords).
I recall an "argument" a few years ago with Ing. Kofee where I said, literally, that Agnelli should resign himself to being considered "nationally popular" and the engineer's reaction was to get terribly angry...
Now, I don't want to say that after all this time this is proof I was right, but what makes me smile the most is that next to the news online you find comments from various fans and the word most used is "betrayal". I don't want to come across as presumptuous, but it makes me think "damn, to realize this only at the first (last?) harmless appearance at the Ariston since 2001 seems like being beautifully asleep in the grove of my and our imagination..."
Well, luckily I'm someone who thinks negatively by default (almost always, if necessary) and I got over the disappointment (for what it's worth now that we are well past 30...) in the last 96 months...but who will think of the weaker among the children of God (throw in any random name)?
Bye.
Mo."
What does cptgaio think now after seeing them at Sanremo?
Email to the same friends, dated February 18, 2009 (the definitions and comparisons are merely provocative, don't be mean to me...)
"Last night Sanremo started and finally, after a couple of months of "predictions", I can give a judgment.
I premise that it's not shocking that they were eliminated because it's well known that the Ariston punishes unusual proposals (don't bring up Elio because "La Terra dei Cachi" was the most alternatively conformist song in history), in fact besides Agnelli, the third most beautiful song proposed, Tricarico's, also lost out (Zanicchi was also eliminated, but that was like shooting the Red Cross).
I mentioned the third most beautiful song in Tricarico's case because in second place I would put Dolcenera's and in first place the surprising one from Afterhours: listening to "Il Paese è reale", a jarring almost post-rock pastiche, the question to ask is "why if Agnelli still has songs like this in his repertoire, has he been boring us with absurd lullabies for ten years?" and especially "why present it at Sanremo when you know it will never be understood?" (and indeed it was sent home).
In hindsight, it makes me think that Agnelli, the most powerful man in our Indie scene, wanted to prove to all the longtime fans (and age-dated like myself) that he still knows how to do alternative music and brings the song he most sees fit to Sanremo when we know that writing a Sanremo-style song wouldn't have been so difficult for him (a semi-self-plagiarism of "Non è per sempre" would have been enough, who would have noticed? Mario Luzzato Fegiz?).
It's a strange choice: you go to Sanremo to have a popular audience and then you play the June of '44... Manuel, Manuel, Manuel...
Mo."
Now cptgaio tries to be serious for once and tells you what they think now...
I learned that "Il Paese è Reale" will be included in a collection with pieces presented by other Italian independent artists: now I believe that using the Sanremo leverage (for whatever it’s still worth) to "advertise" this operation is quite a noble thing (we'll see if they reissue "I Milanesi uccidono il Sabato" with the new piece: that would be a bit less noble) and the reasons seem so obvious that I won't even bother explaining them, but I want to express a few impressions about the song.
"Il Paese è Reale" made me relive emotions that I hadn't felt for at least ten years listening to something by Agnelli & Co.: the sense of defeat, the bitterness in front of the failure of our rebellions, that magnificent formal imperfection I found in the dissonances and technical flaws of the Afterhours that seemed to me now irremediably "fixed", the sincerity and being almost naked in front of other human beings...
...and still believing that simplicity is a virtue and not a defect.
I don't want to judge the piece "technically" (I'm not even sure if I'm capable of doing it anymore) but I can say it made me find a friend again.
And that's enough.
And now let them send it full blast (I won't put the winking emoji...)
Mo.
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