Stoney

I conclude it in an even more Aristotelian way. I crack up with laughter when, in the company of friends, I put on the Italian comedies of Boldi-De Sica; these two actors are geniuses of cinema, unlike Kubrick, who they say is a genius but makes you dreadfully bored. Not to mention the kiss I shared with the girl I had been trying to woo for months at the first of May concert to the notes of a Carmen Consoli song: a poetic and beautiful moment that will be etched in my memory for years, therefore Carmen Consoli is a serious singer, no doubt about it. When I was a bit younger, the 883 cassette was a must-have with friends, and we had a blast singing "Rotta per casa di Dio," all happy and in great company, so Max Pezzali is a genius of music. However, there was this one time when I was 18 and went with my school to a classical music concert; they played the entire Ninth Symphony by Beethoven, and I was bored out of my mind, while everyone else couldn't wait to go home. From that day on, Beethoven has been a pain for me, so he’s an idiot who doesn’t understand anything about music; honestly, I don't get those who sing his praises. Come on, isn’t it better to have Venditti, who at least performs when Roma wins the championship, and everyone hugs and kisses even if they don’t know each other while singing "Grazie Roma" in unison? In my opinion, there’s no comparison, those are truly great artists. P.S. I'm not 20, I'm much older. If you’re over 15, you should be worried.

"It’s always about trifles on the slippery slab of a shadow director." Yes, I believed instead that when such a repellent idiosyncratic mechanism comes to the end of an asymptotic chiasm, it fundamentally insinuates itself into the very substance of the syntax of the average able-bodied human being, which, when compared to, for example, an average Caucasian individual, we notice is at least somewhat reversible by a bit. In conclusion, paraphrasing the quid, we find that the author's thesis is the symptomatic nothingness of the end of everything.

"There is often something unspeakable in Chabrol's female characters, a deviation, a marginality in relation to the scene, the presence of a radical otherness in relation to the normality of life." Is this Italian?

Well, I think it's terrible. After hearing the first track, I've heard them all. The voice is always the same, the sound is always the same, just one type of dynamic; the only thing that makes a difference between the tracks, I don't know, maybe it's the breaks between the various riffs, but that seems a bit too little to call it a miracle. It's an incredible flatness. Many have recommended it to me, but I don't see the point of such an album's existence. You metalheads always put me in front of an existential dilemma: is it me who doesn't understand anything about music (and yet I listen to quite a bit) or is it you who just need a fast riff and an ultra-distorted guitar to go wild, forgetting any aesthetic judgment? Who knows.

Georgia Lee is a masterpiece... I knew the cover by an Irish group (Solas), and I didn't know it was hers. The lyrics are disarmingly delicate, especially the last two verses, which may seem trivial if read like this, but in context evoke images of limitless poetry. The frog in the grass, the crow in the grain, the flowers by the road, and meanwhile the hills that turn from green to gold again, a sign of the passing time, the looming autumn, while somewhere a child calls for their mother... an atmosphere of unparalleled melancholy and evocativeness... and then again the refrain with its relentless pacing. A masterpiece, no two ways about it. I will get the album as soon as possible.

Music that rocks... yes, the balls. You see, making music today is just a hobby for spoiled, rich kids who are already loaded with cash. It works like this: if you have nothing to do in life, if your concern isn't working or studying to support yourself in the future because you've already got billions, then you can afford the luxury of spending 10 or 20 thousand euros (peanuts) to record an album professionally, make promotional videos, and buy radio ads, so maybe you can make a name for yourself. Of course, the quality of the music is secondary; in fact, music is just a pretext to promote yourself. Although I don't personally know Vanilla Sky, something tells me it works the same way for them. Fine, the Qube isn't the Olimpico, but in recent years it has seen a frightening rise in popularity and "elitism." At first, it hosted groups of youngsters, then the "filter" got tighter (until a few years ago, you could still catch some good concerts), and now unfortunately it has become a club where only the friends of those who run it can perform, all at the expense of the quality of the music offered. We're in Italy, and if you're not friends with "those who count," you have little hope. I believe these losers, instead of playing at the Qube (which, like it or not, is one of the two or three most important venues in Rome for live music), deserve to spend ten years in hard labor, forced to listen to the entire discographies of REAL rock bands from 1960 to today. But oh well, the world is upside down now, and I can only acknowledge it.

But what a drag... why does everyone always have to get philosophical? Okay, I did it too, but I was wrong, I admit it, and it's no longer relevant... The fact is that at least as far as I'm concerned, the discussion is very, very simple: Vasco is a poor fool, with an IQ of 1, plain and simple. I don’t dislike him for some mysterious reason; to me, someone like him just seems like a pathetic idiot, that's all. His success is due to factors that have nothing to do with his skill as an artist. He is a phenomenon of subculture promoted by the media, just like many others have been, and like all low-grade media phenomena, he manages to divide the masses: there are those who claim he is a genius and those who say he is the worst crap. Exactly like what happens with Big Brother or Maria de Filippi's shows; when you serve the public low intellectual quality and a lot of nonsensical drivel, some say "what is this crap" and others think "no, wait, it can't be that this doesn't make sense; it must make sense, otherwise so many people wouldn’t like it", and thus they create monsters to justify it (like: it's society that doesn't understand, this is true art, not that of the 'old folks', we are the true rebels, the cultural spokespeople for a misunderstood generation, etc...). And this is so glaring that there are even people who go so far as to praise a song like "Faccio il militare" (I can honestly produce better under the influence of alcohol, as I believe anyone else could). So in conclusion: it's not "us" who are going against the tide because it only takes a bit of common sense to think Vasco is an idiot. You're the ones trying to give him dignity and artistic value at all costs.

No, it's not mass selling that is synonymous with stupidity: it's the sale of Vasco's discs, because they exploit stupidity to drive the market. It's different. I'm upset with Vasco, not with the market; see, you haven't understood anything? I'm upset with those who give him money, I'm upset with that slice of the economy (pretty big) that sells the image of an idiot who manages to become a myth. And I've wasted more than enough words trying to prove that he's an idiot, when not a single word is needed because it's obvious. The people who listen to Vasco don't think, they cancel their brain functions, even the most basic ones, to the point that, as I've said countless times, they don't even realize that entire phrases he mumbles make no sense... 8 million people singing "e si potevano mangiare anche le fragole" gives me chills, because no one thinks that phrase means a damn thing; in fact, they all tell you that song is poetry! It's evident then that people don't even pay attention; it's evident that the prevailing attitude is "oh well... who cares... instead of thinking, just sing it’s nice," which is NOT art and even less so is it communication, PERIOD. I won't repeat it ANYMORE. Last year I went to Verona to see the Pearl Jam concert, and even there thousands of people were singing at the top of their lungs, idolizing the band, but it's different, and not just because they are my favorite band, but because the Pearl Jam have said something in 20 years. Almost everyone there knew the lyrics by heart, a sign that they read and understood them, and you certainly don't read and learn a Pearl Jam song (which isn't exactly simple even for those who know English) if you’re not interested in knowing what it's about. That is an example of communication that works, even though clearly the commercial aspect is there too, and it's quite impressive (no doubt...), but at least something beautiful gets saved, and it doesn't make me want to throw everything in the trash. As for the question of who I like today, I'll tell you... apart from historical bands like these, which are true exceptions in today's economic-musical landscape, for quite some time my relationship with music has consisted of jamming in a garage with my band and going around clubs to see new bands performing in front of 30 people. Just yesterday, for example, I ended up in a venue here in Rome, and I saw the concert of a band of young guys who, with the utmost humility and simplicity, got on stage and played their songs (original, interesting, excellently played, beautiful, fun), managing to create a really evocative atmosphere. The audience was made up exclusively of their friends who were there out of sympathy and probably don't understand anything about their music, and then there was me and a friend, the only real spectators who went there out of curiosity to hear their concert. This is what you have to do today to hear music played with passion... in that hour and a half, I saw on stage the genuine desire to express, to create, and to play that people stuffed with money and cocaine like your favorite artist have forgotten for 40 years. And this makes me feel sadness, and sadness turns into intolerance...

"What's wrong with having fun?"... Nothing. I remember when I was 12, I had a blast listening to the 883, while my peers were drooling over the Take That. We all had fun, and there was really nothing wrong with it. Then we grew up. But now let me tell you a story. Have you ever heard of "semiotics of passions"? It's the science that advertisers use to persuade people to buy their products. It's quite simple: they study the stimuli to which the human mind is most receptive, what catches its attention the most, what is remembered best. In short, they study the most effective levers to convey the desired message. These are almost always passions like love, pain, belonging to a group, sexuality, and fun. In almost all advertisements, the sexual sphere is stimulated to grab attention and lower the "rational" defenses of the potential buyer. It's well-known, and the same goes for other equally intense passions; there are billions of them, and they are the result of careful and thorough studies, not just chatter. There are people paid millions to do these things, to think of the most despicable and cunning ways to convince others to do or think something. In the end, it's somewhat normal, but when we find the same logic co-opted and packaged as an entire musical phenomenon like Vasco, it really gets under my skin. I don't mind that people have fun; what bothers me is what's behind it, how people come to think that Vasco is fun, that he's great, that he's cool. Credit goes to Vasco himself, to those who manage his image, to those who suggest the right words to put in his lyrics, to those who simplify the arrangements so they can be understood by every dimwit who turns on the radio or TV... it's all the same. We're still talking about manipulated critical sense favored by mass media and ignorance. Not to mention that when someone like Vasco reaches the peak of success and people start talking about "art," "symbol," "monument," we're no longer talking about simple fun, but we're facing the most glaring case in history of shit being passed off as gold, of someone who managed to convince you all that, in the end, shit can also be good (and fun). Now you throw it back on fun to justify your love for Vasco, when before in other reviews you used elaborate and grandiose language to show that he was objectively a genius. It doesn't make sense, there's a contradiction. Before, Vasco was a genius due to his artistic and communicative merits, now we've come down to "what's wrong with having fun," you've lowered your standards. Though, there's still a hint of that desire to mythologize him at all costs: you're not even ashamed to associate this pile of garbage with artists of the caliber of Alberto Sordi. If this isn’t media alienation... It's also alienation to admire him because "he likes girls and he openly admits it"... a sad phrase like his songs. If someone else had said that, people would probably (and rightly) be outraged, but since it's Vasco, he's a symbol, a guru, he doesn't care about society, so he's cool. Revolutions aren't made by sheer insults and scandalous statements thrown in the face of "decent people" (who no longer exist), unfortunately, it's also necessary to say something concrete, otherwise everyone is good at it.

What a drag... But commercial isn't just Tiziano Ferro or Pausini! Do Dream Theater sell or not? In Italy, they sell out stadiums and charge good money for it (70 euros a ticket...), right? Why shouldn’t they be considered commercial just because they don’t appear on TRL? Who cares! Besides, in America, Dream Theater videos air on MTV just like Vasco and Ligabue do here, but "commercial" has a pretty broad meaning; it doesn’t just mean stupid pop music. Commercial is anything that exploits a consumer trend to make big profits; it’s directing your offering based on the predominant tastes and demands of the audience, meaning if the audience likes x, we give them x. If instead of x we give them y, the audience won’t buy, so it isn’t profitable. Nothing simpler than the law of supply and demand, which I don’t have a problem with in itself, but when we're talking about "art," maybe... Dream Theater fans alone in Italy are millions, and yet they still feel like a "niche" audience, poor them. Overall, metal as a whole is commercial because it sells, it has always sold, and it will continue to sell indefinitely. Think of Metallica and Iron Maiden, who are known even by people who don't understand a thing about metal, and their billion-dollar bank accounts that your Tiziano Ferro will never see. The comparison between metal and the rest of the world in terms of commerciality doesn’t hold up. America churns out metal bands, especially extreme ones, in abundance. This shows that someone is investing in these bands, even if most of the time they make terrible music, because the fanatics buying the records never end. It’s all about money there too, can we stop with this supposed inferiority of other genres compared to metal? In particular, in the case of Dream Theater, you could say they are commercial because every single album that has come out has been exactly what the average metalhead expected. Every time a new album comes out, metal fanzines are filled with people saying "geniiiiiii!!! masterpiece!!! what technique!!! what speed!!! Petrucci alien!!! Portnoy monster!!!!", and crap like that (the same old lines since 1991). DT have now found the formula to maximize sales: lots of technique BUT occasionally catchy melodies (you only need one melody to cry miracle), so it’s not said that they are ONLY technical, huh!... Zero innovation, less than zero imagination, but plenty of empty technical proficiency and lots of acrobatics to amaze the audience with special effects. And those who praise them are the 14-year-olds who have only ever heard Master of Puppets and Images and Words, still scouring with a magnifying glass for flaws in the egg, the smudge on a single note, who come out with exasperating phrases like "Dream Theater play Master of Puppets BETTER," or have the nerve to tell you that Malmsteen is just technique for its own sake while The Dance Of Eternity is "functional to the album," or that Pink Floyd are great EVEN THOUGH they aren't technical (??!??!?) because they can make beautiful songs EVEN with ONLY three notes! As usual, ignorance reigns supreme, and some take advantage of it. And how do you call this? I call it COMMERCIAL...