Ben Watt
North Marine Drive + Summer Into Winter

In this debut work, we find our Benjamin Brian Thomas Watt… um, who would that be?

Ignorant fools!

That would be Ben Watt… um (here we go again), like “and who is that”?

He would be one of the two members of EBTG, or as it would be clumsily said in Italian (the one with many spots) the “TTLR”… um (again), who would they be?

Simple, they would be the ones from that band that borrowed from a furniture store the advertising slogan that promised customers to provide everything for their bedroom except the girl um, “Everything But The Girl” ça va sans dire, compris?

By the way, the other half of the two (such Tracey Anne Thorn um, two months older) legally became in 2008 (after only 27 years of concubinage or cohabitation) his half in private life too, and together they created, in addition to the albums of “Everything But The Girl”, two twin girls, namely Jean & Alfie in '98, and the little one (um, now twenty) Blake born in 2001 um, end of the “gossip”.

Okay, let's get back to the topic!

This is the debut album of such BBTW mentioned above, I'm listening to it today for the very first time in my life and I strongly doubt it will be the last, as it grabbed me very well, also because it features on piano and vocals none other than Robert Wyatt-Ellidge, not just here and there or bits of someone (which I personally prefer the entire ones... but that's another story or truly!).

What else to add except that track no. 9 “You're Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go” is from the distant '75 and is penned by none other than (once again...) Robert Allen Zimmerman, yes, yes, exactly him “Bob Dylan” in person.

And what else to add except that the good Ben always gave me the impression of being a bit sickly, seeing him both in videos and photos, only my impression was not mistaken at all because I read today on wiki (my favorite encyclopedia) that in '92, Watt was diagnosed with EGPA (eosinophilic granulomatosis with polyangiitis) also known as “Churg-Strauss syndrome”, an extremely rare and potentially fatal autoimmune condition, and that in the end, nearly 5 meters of necrotized small intestine (about 75%...) were removed, leaving him with a permanently restricted diet, subsequently in '97 BW wrote the memoir “Patient” (192 pages) about these experiences with illness and subsequent recovery.

And nothing, actually no, listen to this beautiful album with very soft atmospheres and you will not be disappointed at all, word of Maurizio (Stanlio for friends from the DeB).

PS I just noticed that there was already another beautiful review of the same album written by some Lello in 2005 on Christmas Eve which describes the atmospheres much better than I did above (well, read it because it's really worth it),