Blonde Redhead
Fake Can Be Just As Good

THE REVIEW

More or less well translated, the title of this album sounds something like: "the frames can be taken for good." Or for the more refined, "between being and seeming, the boundary is very thin (assuming it's always necessary)"

Surprisingly discovered even in Italy thanks to the (laudable) interest of Thurston Moore from Sonic Youth, who released their splendid debut "La Mia Vita Violenta" on the Smells Like Records SLR label, Blonde Redhead is, in fact, a group that is two-thirds Italian: the musicians (two brothers) develop refined and experimental "sonic" textures at the center of which is the Japanese vocalist and guitar-leader Kazu Makino.

After such a debut, enthusiastically received by critics, the group, naturalized in that New York post Velvet Underground and Andy Warhol and now the homeland of Sonic Youth (but the cultural profile is quite well preserved) which has experimented since its inception with the encounter between "Rock" (or music that connects to the idea of Pop) and Art (cultured), (Pop Music vs Pop Art), with this second work, they land at Touch & Go in Chicago, the label of Fugazi (historical leaders of noise-rock) and Shellac, to which another splendid Italian group had arrived shortly before: the Catanese Uzeda. Thus, it is sometimes the groups and producers from overseas who discover the jewels of "our home," and then the colleagues from across the Channel fall in love with them to the point of wanting them on tour: Stereolab, indeed prominent exponents of British indie-rock (also very close to Velvet Underground) adored in turn by Paul Hartnoll of Orbital ("other faces, other voices" but the same very high level) heard through their leader Martin Kean... let it be known that Blond Redhead are "like Sonic Youth, but perhaps a bit better, with something more that is not easily defined..."

Momentarily under the same spotlight as Page Hamilton and Ian McKaye in the States, regular guests of Arezzo Wave, and other fundamental (but unfortunately "elite") events in Italy, the authors of these authentic fictions or (authentic fictions) on this album approach perhaps a more electric and compact form of their compositions (the languages used are English, sometimes French and German) always with a melodic intuition that emerges from a form now structured in more sophisticated architectures now more "fractured," to use another slang.

More percussive, denser at the guitar level (it seems that the proximity to the bands mentioned with the addition of the top-class Jesus Lizard, also signed to Touch & Go) has resulted in a further enrichment from a compositional point of view. In episodes such as "Kazuality," "Symphony Of Treble" or "Pier Paolo" (the same dedication to the great Director and Writer of the debut album) this perhaps appears more evident. Perhaps it doesn’t have the same lyrical pathos as the debut album, perhaps a more "ad hoc" production that nevertheless allows less freedom to creative expression has ended up acting as a limiting factor, perhaps (simply) it is a less inspired work than the previous one.

Mastery on the guitars and rhythmic and hypnotic bass lines like certain post-wave, and the drumming that sometimes seems really one of the most fascinating aspects, as well as the very particular, thin, almost fragile yet at the same time strongly expressive voice of the singer, characterize what, if not "the best album" (also because it's only the second one), is certainly at least a confirmation of the real and tangible talent of its Authors. Who have recently stated to "live the experience of music close in form to Sonic Youth but with the soul of Lucio Battisti..." Perhaps what the frontman of Stereolab couldn't grasp is precisely this... we (hope) it's just like this.

Lucio Battisti meets Thurston Moore? Possibly Maybe...

Mind the Gap, please.