Dislocation

Here is someone who finally "dares" to speak well of an Italian singer-songwriter product, now that we hear from many sides that singer-songwriter music no longer exists and has been replaced by the hip-hop scene (horror!!), now that everyone says that the young people don't want to take a stance anymore, neither against nor in favor of anything, that no one takes a side... Well, people like Brunori speak, confidently and without falling into easy decadentisms, taking a stand on the things of life just like representatives of singer-songwriter music would have done forty years ago, maybe throwing in a little politics, which is always better than descending into cacophony, as many prefer to do, addressing certain themes and then descending into a crude and marketable refrain. Of course, we pay the price of having to compare today’s poetic musicians with those who came before them, but Guccini, De André, De Gregori, Lolli and their singing companions belong, despite their greatness, to an irreplaceable era, and in some respects one that should not be repeated. The middle generation, the singer-songwriters of the 90s, produced great promises not always kept, even if the depth remained considerable, and I think of Silvestri, Fabi, etc.

Then, at the end of the tens, the wave (or wavelet?) of singer-songwriters with unpronounceable and somewhat misleading names (the winner is Le Luci Della Centrale Elettrica), perhaps guilty only of resting on the laurels of a poetic-descriptive form that is sometimes excessively sparse, to the point of seeming intentionally poor.

Thus, one can gladly read Joe's beautiful and precise review, which flows well without glorifying but giving credit to an artist who, upon listening to this product, manages to pique curiosity even about previous works... Thank you, Joe, 5 for the review and 4 for the album. I hope to read you again soon!

Ah, by the way, it's true, some of us "old folks" have somewhat snubbed him for his hipster appearance that would fit nicely in an ad for any city car or a trendy aperitif, sitting with other long-bearded tattooed iPhone users in a spot along the Navigli...

Lulù, never a disappointment from you, neither in terms of choice nor in review. 5/5, what else?

I almost forgot, five to the review, to the record I'll tell you...

You know what, I wasn't familiar with the group or the album, but I liked your review so much, I mean in terms of semantics and the extension of the concept, that I have to find out more about it, if only to understand what the hell you wrote and with what purpose, for goodness' sake, sorry for the Gallicism. I promise.

Four to the reception and three to the disco. Thanks, Rinaldi!

Dear Lulu, you’ve acknowledged that you’ve let yourself go a bit, and it's always positive to recognize one’s flaws, even amidst the evident sincerity of your writing. Still, I can’t quite understand on what principle you place the Bauhaus (I saw them too, in the same year, baaammm, a revelation for me as well) and Zappa on such evidently different planes of “deity,” and this comes from someone who has ingested and digested quite a bit of Bowie and Zappa, truly. They are simply two of the faces of that diamond which is rock, or rather music in general. If I must make a selection, well, Beethoven sits at the right hand of the Father, look, alongside Lennon, Bowie, Wonder, Ellington, and Coltrane. To the left, McCartney, Jaco, Fripp, Hendrix, and Eno. Ah, Zappa is the father. I don’t have a huge reverence for him, but one must acknowledge his manifest superiority over the thinking and playing human race, one must. However, I really enjoy your descriptive style, censorial and critical, debatable (we're here for this, right?) and sincere, a pleasure to read... If you’ve understood that rock is irrationality, approach Zappa and Fripp. Irrationality doesn’t have to accompany disorganization. And I don’t believe you at all when you say you don’t think; you think too much... Ah, I also adored Murphy, even when I saw Bauhaus open for Miriam Si Sveglia A Mezzanotte.......... The concert you’re referring to must be the one I saw outdoors in Bologna; it was a blast, but it was the Bauhaus, not Bowie, fantastic but not imperial. One of the best concerts I remember, anyway, and how many have I forgotten. With affection, Dislocation.

No, sorry, I messed up! Five stars for the review, of course, oh dear, goodness gracious!

Well done, Lulu!

Rece badass as always, an embarrassing piece of work, saved only a bit by Fabi, and Godano, as always, charming as shit in bed.

Dear Woodstock, I hereby declare my eternal gratitude to you... Do you know how many, at the mere mention of H17, look at you with wide eyes and shake their heads in disbelief? Yet they were ahead of so many pretentious prudes and self-proclaimed gurus of the electro scene back then, which was called technopop, it’s true, and certainly, on a technical level, light-years ahead of their former colleagues in Human League, infinitely more polished and fussy. Of course, I remember well, in years when Italy was still trying to confront the pervasive disengagement that was spreading at that time, hearing such a "new" group that titled one of their tracks so explicitly, without metaphor, was a comfort. We told ourselves that if music was changing, perhaps it wasn't guaranteed that brains were changing for the worse as well... The events would prove us wrong, you know... And anyway, the first two albums of H17 gave us many moments of enjoyment, didn't they?
If you recall, there was an LP by B.E.F. called "Music for listening to" that was a delight of minimal and compact electronics, serious and not self-congratulatory, containing the seeds of future productions like those by H17, of which they were an integral part.
Great review, as always well written and excellently documented... I, however, being new here, just wanted to ask you where the sax was in "Heroes" that you mentioned...