ARSEN PALESTINI
social nearness

THE REVIEW

ARSEN PALESTINI presents 'SOCIAL NEARNESS'

https://open.spotify.com/album/0RlGgbp02NIrKawHWXmFH4?si=IzeeYY88QKCHQGyyJKCASQ

A year after his last album (Finding a new job), Arsen Palestini returns with this new work. The scope is more or less the same. We are in the lo-fi hip hop zone, with beats almost always downtempo, supported by soundscapes that wander between indie, funk grooves, and jazzy atmospheres. The keyboards are the main element in the arrangements. Toy keyboards whose sounds seem to have come out of some Commodore. Definitely, the set staged by Arsen could be a summary of all that cultural substratum that was elaborately showcased by the Beastie Boys with their ultra-cool magazine Grand Royal. So we're talking about pure coolness. While there's no doubt about the sonic aspect of this album, we have some reservations regarding the lyrics. It's indeed a pity that Arsen strives to write in Italian on only three tracks, which, not surprisingly, are the most successful, also because they are very "committed" lyrics, with a focus on the here and now, particularly “Ancora a fare guerre,” which could be a great anthem to blast at full volume under some NATO base or in front of the Ministry of Defense that perhaps has forgotten that “Italy repudiates war” and instead sends weapons to Ukraine as if nothing happened.