C.S.I.
Ko De Mondo

Oh, if in 1994 I had been seventeen as I am now, I would have cried at the first listen. An orphan of CCCP, listening to this marvel. "Ko De Mondo" is one of the most accomplished CDs by Consorzio Suonatori Indipendenti, from the graphics to the music, not to mention one of the best Italian CDs of the last twenty years.

Two tormented, restless, infinite eyes fixate impenetrably on an unspecified point beyond the hands holding the cover. Just for this cover, the CD would deserve a 10. We are faced with an innovation; Giovanni and Massimo, united with some former Litfiba members, are a rare explosive mix to imitate. In the booklet, photographs of both disturbing and serene Breton farmhouses mix with pure Ferrettian lyrics. The good old Giovanni knows how to make every place he visits a pen, a specific metric, an intonation. Every place in him lives and flows into the Zambonian guitars, the Magnellophonic sounds of Maestro Magnelli, in Maroccolo's bass, in Giorgio Canali's disturbed sounds, Gulli's drums, Gerby's percussion, and the rare choirs of Ginevra Di Marco (a wonderful voice in "La Lune du Prajou" and "Home Sweet Home", who from now on will begin to have an increasingly important role in the group).

What to say, a bit of pro-Soviet punk survives despite everything, especially in tracks like "A tratti", "Celluloide", "Home Sweet Home", and "Finestère"; for the rest, we are faced with a nearly unclassifiable and innovative alternative experimentation. It goes from Ferretti's melodious recitative in "Palpitazione Tenue" (a piece dedicated to the Pietà and the drama of constantly changing and maturing) to unique and precious tracks like "Del Mondo", almost an epitaph to the world, where graters, Magnellophones, guitars, Marco Parente's percussions, and Ferretti's voice create a masterpiece, or like "Intimisto", which as the title suggests, mixes an unprecedented harmony for the group that seems to revert to a perfection of CCCP pieces like Annarella and Madre, alla intimità umana.
The I, with a double Ferrettian voice, slow, caressed, light, and harmonious, opens to its own mystery, to sensations, and touches everything the listener has inside. Tracks like "Occidente", between folk music and rock, betray a bit of the old Resistant soul of CCCP, but improved, optimized, with more refined, particularized lyrics and logically a less scratchy and more "veiled" melody.

This CD also presents genius tracks that have made the group's history like "Memorie di Una Testa Tagliata" and "In Viaggio". The former is a long reflection of a severed head, which recalls the guillotine in thought, and which caresses all the moods of a replay of a severed head on a wonderful melody that gets lost under a "southern Slavic sky not without grace", all interrupted here and there by cybernetic interferences that recall the Battiato of "La Cura". The latter track is a look at all those who, in search of something, travel. From the losers "more suited to change" to "His Holiness", the journey, one of the few things that brings us all closer. Tracks like "Le Lune De Parjou" seem like interludes to facilitate dreams and reflections. Entirely instrumental track "disturbed" exclusively by the splendid voice of Ginevra di Marco. "Fuochi Nella Notte", the lightest and most acoustic of the tracks on the entire CD, is also one of their best songs ever.

In short, Brittany seems to inspire the group, impregnating it like a sort of holy spirit, benefiting every aspect: from music to lyrics. A unique album, to have, for lovers and not of the genre. Forgive the length, but CSI, like CCCP and PGR, are groups that need to be narrated, not just reviewed. Folkloric-indigenous soul and melody are a wonderful synergy in "Ko De Mondo"