coolermaster

I would just like to add that "Falsum et violentia" is the cover of the title track from the 1978 movie HALLOWEEN composed by John Carpenter... Other than that, it's a nice album, although I prefer (it might be blasphemous) Ralefun.

Like all geniuses, he "shat" the texts in solitude.... "emotions recollected in tranquillity," the English romantics used to say.... Far from the mad crowd and the Majors.... And a healthy fuck you to the "presumed" and hypothetical audience!! In Italy in '69, if you said "ummagumma," they thought about a new suppository for a cough; imagine a work like "In cauda semper stat venenum"....

You're struggling to understand why you are one of those who lack the power of "(de)contextualization"... No, don't take it the wrong way, it's not an insult... Alright, Tardo Pede is NOT a masterpiece, if by masterpiece you mean acrobatic scores like Yes, lightning-fast guitars, and a "panty-shredding" rhythm section... It's NOT a masterpiece if you stick to the "song" logic, no matter how complex or elongated it might be. It's NOT a masterpiece if masterpieces are considered to be "In the Court Of the Crimson King," "Close to the Edge," or "Pawn Hearts," not to mention Ummagumma or Atom Heart Mother...
It is a masterpiece because it is ITALIAN! Because NOBODY, and I mean NOBODY at the time (not even in England) had dared to do the unthinkable! To create music that many years later would be called Gothic or Esoteric... Not even Black Sabbath had ventured that far... especially in music, as Bertocetti rightly emphasizes. In Italy, in the realm of the "canzonetta," more or less authored, but even in the most precious Prog, works like "In cauda semper.." and "In Tardo Pede" were showers, no, rather cold hurricanes... Satan? Black Masses? Witches? Pipe organ as a solo instrument? Hahahah... Only Goblin (partially) and copying would do that later for Argento's soundtracks... No, these works are IMMENSE, more unique than rare in the Italian scene and beyond at the time... Once again we have demonstrated that WE Italians, when we put our minds to it, can launch trends, create genres, styles, indigenous musical languages, yet universal... I believe that very few Bands in the history of rock can boast a silent but tangible plagiarism lasting for 40 years... and let anyone who doesn’t think that what Antonius Rex did with Jacula and the homonymous band changed the face of Metal, along with a series of other genres that would only be codified years later, raise their hand... The use of Latin, Satanic iconography, cryptic lyrics intended to be "evil" in the noblest sense combined with a wise use of social metaphors (without resorting to politics as was common at the time), and an instrumentation that shunned melody, refrained from butt-kissing riffs were fundamental. The value of these works (I’m also speaking of Antonius Rex) is immense... They managed to create the iconography dear to "metal" without ever playing real "Metal"... in this too they were iconoclasts or better yet, iconophagists... Sublime!!

First of all, hats off to the New Trolls, who have bravely (and these days that takes courage) created a sequel to the legendary 2 "concerti grossi" of the seventies. Kudos for the recording, which is truly spectacular! Listening to The seven Seasons, I believe, puts to rest any debate between "analogists" of Vinyl and "Digitalists" of CD... The warmth radiating from each single note, combined with the absolute clarity of the digital medium, delivers truly emotional moments. The album is the natural and successful "cover" of themselves... Just the first notes of Knowledge are enough to dispel any doubts, any uncertainty regarding this artistic and commercial endeavor. Much better than the latest works of Le Orme or PFM... Sometimes "moving forward" means staying behind... and the New Trolls have decided to "revisit" every nuance, every score of the "old" concert grosso n°1, more than the 2... No, they haven't been tempted by certain Neo-Progressive sounds that mix electronics, crossover, or Metal... A work that has the flavor of nostalgia, but doesn’t come across as pathetic... A work that reminds us of a time when Italy was a harbinger of exceptional music, original rock, and excellently played.

I find "Lo shampoo" by Gaber one of the most genius songs of the last 40 years in Italy. Period. Brilliant both musically and conceptually. Then I could name a handful more. de Gregori is "the prince"... someone who, despite being on the left, has never written particularly "politicized" lyrics... like every true artist. Of course, he has also stumbled along the way... so what? Dylan has made at least 6 or 7 albums that are unbearable.. the soft parade by the doors is a flop.... "The final cut" by Pink Floyd is negligible (just because I like it because I lived it in a particular moment of my life doesn't change the fact that artistically it's a colossal bore)... and I could go on with a thousand other artists... Italian and otherwise. But please, let's stop with the comparisons... Would you compare Bach to Mahler? Armstrong to Coltrane? How can you? Battisti wrote at least 10 songs that have entered history... and to be fair, there are those who are beginning to seriously question Mogol's contribution to the lyrics... since he hasn't written anything noteworthy... after all... Gaetano was a dissident, an iconoclast... and above all it’s clear that he was having a fantastic time... here! However, comparing "La leva calcistica", "generale", "La donna cannone" or the recent (absolute masterpiece) "Il cuoco di salò" to "nuntereggaepiù", "Sfiorivano le viole", "mio fratello è figlio unico" is more stupid than heretical. Different languages, cultures, and styles... Just as you can't compare Gaber's aesthetics (which is anyway closer to Gaetano's) to those of a Guccini or a Battiato! What do they have to do with each other? Let's stop with these controversies from a provincial and ignorant Italy that Rino has criticized so much!! It does justice neither to us nor to our intelligence...

I would like to remind you that "Battiato," "Baglioni," "Battisti," "de Gregori," and "Venditti" are certainly not from the north, yet they have made music history (like it or not) in this country.
Gaetano was surreal, he was ahead of his time, and at the same time carefree. Just as one cannot compare Joyce's "Finnegans Wake" to, say... "Poe" or "Manzoni".... so? Different styles.....
As I said, I prefer the aesthetics of Mogol's verses, the timeless melodies of Battisti, but I recognize in Rino a rare intellectual clarity that translated into "streams of words" (or consciousness) that need to be framed in a deconstruction of the verse as such... requiring the translation of metaphor and allegory to be understood.... Battisti and Gaetano? Two different geniuses.
Battisti was a musician, Gaetano was not. Battisti was always in search of new sound, as in "Anima Latina" first and then in "Don Giovanni"… Gaetano used music to communicate his puns, more the offspring of the '77 movement than that of '68... and that's why he was understood later.
Battisti was serious, or rather, he took himself seriously; Gaetano did not. And those who do not take themselves seriously are unlikely to be taken seriously by others in a provincial country...
Certainly, there would never have been Vasco Rossi, the Skiantos, and the entire generation of dementic rock stars without him.
Goodbye.

I argue that the Beatles were the Beatles. Regardless, as Totò would say... The greatest mass phenomenon of the golden era of rock. Skill? Yes. Macca has been and still is a great bassist, often confined within the compositional limits of the Pop music he has always produced. Without Ringo Starr's "touch" on the drums (let's not forget that the drums were played offbeat before the Beatles, a style borrowed from Jazz), modern Rock/Pop wouldn't even have been born... Were there better bands than them? There were plenty! Just as Malmsteen or Vai are superior to Gilmour or Richards! So? Their greatness is indisputable, and "that" handful of songs they created changed youth music forever. Others (after them) have done even better, but who remembers "Afterglow" or "Itchykoo Park" by the Small Faces? "She's Not There" or "Time of the Season" by the Zombies? Only the Stones, in terms of depth and merit, can be compared to the Beatles. Everything came from them, especially in the social sphere. In just 7 years, the Beatles did and played everything, from Protopunk (see Helter Skelter) to Folk (Blackbird) to Pop to Rock... everything, always with their very personal style. Old, says Scaruffi. Well, even Miles Davis played fundamentally Be-Bop for 15 years, the Be-Bop of Charlie Parker.

Mammagamma was shaped both in its Title (all too similar to Ummagumma) and in its melody (Another Brick in the Wall) by the image of Pink Floyd, of which Parsons had been the sound engineer... The first time I listened to Mammagamma, I thought of it as a club remix of "Another Brick in the Wall".... A (deliberate) plagiarism.

muahahahhahaha...I agree....and let's stick to the coaster :-))

analoguesound, I ABSOLUTELY agree with your clear and competent analysis in Battistian and musical terms in general: I just have to disagree on one point. The "new right"... call it Fascism, neo-fascism, extra-parliamentary Right, in short, everything that emerged from the ashes of the PNFI in 1947 has evolved, and quite a lot. Just think of the socio-ecological-peaceful experiments of the Hobbit Camps in the '70s, or the "modern" civil political debate currently taking place on many sites dedicated to Fascism. It's incorrect to think of the New Fascism, which emerged precisely with Almirante after the war, distancing itself even from the original Fascism created, conceived, and founded by Mussolini. There are similarities, but the changed historical period has brought about modernisms, both conceptual and intellectual. Fascism, above all, does not mean Racism, nor antisemitism. Let’s leave those filth to the Nazis...
The proof is in the admiration that (taking inspiration from Italo Balbo's sympathies) Neo-Fascists have always had towards the Native Americans, to the point that Ignazio La Russa named his son Geronimo...
Regarding the frankly sterile debate about the alleged fascist (or rather Right-wing) Battisti, I agree with you, and that was the reason for my initial intervention. I mean, to put it bluntly: who cares! Whether he’s from the Right or the Left, he should be judged for the art he created. And by the way, the vast majority of artists I've listened to and continue to listen to are from the Left... :-)
However, to say that a Fascist cannot be modernist or progressive is simply wrong. Sergio Caputo (just to give you another example) mixed Cuban rhythms, jazz, and Italian melodic song (by the way in a rather unusual genre), and is openly RIGHT-wing. That was just one example. It is clear that in the calmbur, in the hermetic nature of many lyrics (not just Battisti’s, but in all Pop\Rock), one can see (or instrumentalize) whatever they want. There are Maiden lyrics that seem to have come directly from the mind of a Nazi official, and even Leonard Cohen years ago composed a song with unsettling and ambiguous lyrics, he who is Jewish!
Sorry for the rambling, but it was just meant to clarify...