Bull Brigade
Perché non si sa mai

There was a saying in the lower Romagna, where I grew up about twenty years ago: when someone with a certain inclination started to become aware of their talent and knowingly master it—no matter what the activity was—it was said that ‘he’d put in the NOS’.

I hadn’t thought about this saying in I don’t know how long.

Then, after finishing the ritual of my first listen of “Perché Non Si Sa Mai,” something must have clicked somewhere in my memory, so much so that it felt natural to wonder at what point in their journey Bull Brigade put in the NOS.

Because whenever punk/hc is discussed, there are purists jumping out from everywhere, right?

For some, “Vita Libertá” (2016) was already lacking bite, for others “Il Fuoco Non Si È Spento” (2021) turned out to be the exact opposite of what its name suggests.

For many, the kids from ‘MotorCity’ brought in the NOS with their debut “Strade Smarrite” (2008), right after Eugenio Borra’s experience with Banda Del Rione ended.

Personally, I think it’s just a matter of perspective.

The fourth full-length from the Turin combo carries the heavy legacy of one of the scene’s most important releases, as well as—the detractors will have to accept it—their entire history.

“Il Fuoco Non Si È Spento” was the first Bull Brigade record to include more than one hand in songwriting. The result was an album that was less ‘straightforward’, definitely missing the Oi! matrix that was the signature of their first two records, and precisely for this reason able to broaden their following and swing open the gates towards a series of important opportunities previously unexplored.

Chiederci ancora

Chi è che sono

E chi è che sei

Guarda che cosa

Mi fa diventare

Sang Eugy in “Anche Se.”

No verse was ever more symbolic.

“Perché Non Si Sa Mai” is Bull Brigade’s most collective album, released at the most important phase of their path: that of reconfirmation.

Thinking they completely missed the mark would be a big mistake.

First: because the band draws heavily from a series of influences already emerged—not without some doubts about how they would be received—in the previous chapter.
Second: because the emotional core of the songs shifts completely.

The cardinal points remain unbreakable: Turin, the outskirts, the Toro, echoes of an industrial past that has lost its centrality leaving only the shards. But today there are children who are growing up.

As a father, I can say it’s almost guaranteed, at some point, you see yourself in your own child. As a son, I can say that becoming a parent often brings up childhood memories that reemerge without much politeness—nostalgic and violent.

Eugy lost his father about ten years ago—a hobbyist musician himself, the one who “con questa musica come malattia / che mi dicevi ‘guarda che quando inizi / dopo non va più via’”—and I imagine that from his current place, it is just as normal to allow himself to drift into memories, returning to the tenderness of those first listens.

And lying, maybe, may be useful to pin a sheriff’s badge of the punk-police to your chest, but the singer-songwriter-hued rock that shapes the album’s moods is a familiar sound for an entire generation.

The album intro, recited by a historic figure from Turin’s countercultural movement like Mario Spesso, rolls out the carpet for a renewed lyricism, even at the risk of going too far. Dropping random English words, for instance, makes some passages awkward and clumsy.

The orchestrations paint a grey sky, but never a dead one:

"Vécio, anche se siamo vecchi

Abbiamo ancora bisogno

Di promesse da farci

Di una città per provarci”

The rhythmic assaults of the past give way to broad pop flourishes, the pride and sense of belonging that once were, now replaced by egotism. The result is a series of refrains that are hard to imagine squeezed among the classics of the repertoire in a live set.

There’s no doubt that the band wanted to look forward, instead of relying on a more than tried-and-true formula. After all, let’s admit it: to keep ‘doing the Nabat thing’ would have been grotesque.

It’s equally true that “Il Fuoco Non Si È Spento” is the kind of record you write once in a lifetime, if you’re lucky.

On a second listen, it’s clear that Bull Brigade have changed their perspective, but missed focus.

The NOS is well and truly spent, and the new material can be seen as the transition album towards a new phase. Not everything is to be thrown away, “Perché Non Si Sa Mai.”

Ad maiora.