coolermaster

Honestly, I have always thought Radiohead were absolutely CRAP, maybe because they came out right in the middle of the "Brit Pop" era... Except for Pablo Honey, which I’ve re-evaluated in hindsight, but the rest... Brrrrrrr... 1000 times better are the Massive Attack... Speaking of innovation...
And anyway, Anathema shit on Radiohead, just to stay on theme...

The album that has (re)defined Metal, like it or not, songs like "The Unforgiven" (a splendid homage to Ennio Morricone, of whom Hetfield has always been a fan), Nothing Else Matters (perhaps the most beautiful Metal ballad of all time), but especially "My Friend of Misery," "Wherever I May Roam," and the shocking (and unsettling) beginning of Enter Sandman will redefine the syntax of Metal to come... Call it if you want Nu... It's the first album, by the way, where Jason Newsted's (blues) contribution is quite significant...

A record that relates to Progressive "stricto sensu" as Elvis Presley does to AC-DC...
Red is an apocalyptic album, light-years ahead of any other product from its generation (except for the German KosmiKe bursts). Modern even today, sulfurous, with a Bruford in a state of grace and a Fripp unleashed among avant-garde, free jazz, rock, and much more. Fripp, the John Zorn of Rock who hasn’t made many records, but when he has, it’s because he had something to say...

After this album, the History of Rock will never be the same. Essential, indispensable, seminal. Three albums during that period were crucial. The self-titled debut by the Doors, Piper at the Gates of Dawn by the Floyd, and with ITCOTCK we reached the point of NO return.
Incredible how LIZARD, In the Wake of Poseidon, and especially Starless and Bible Black are on the same level. I believe very few other bands can claim this.

The cornerstone of HEAVY METAL in the modern sense of the term. The rest is nonsense... NWOBHM??? Saxon weren't even worthy of tying the shoes of Iron... The Priest? The Priest were closer to Motörhead and therefore in the realm of modern Metal... Heavy Metal was born with Black Sabbath and was codified with Iron Maiden, and I'm tired of repeating it... Let's also forget about all the iconography that Iron created, as it would take books to write for those who experienced them at the time... Regards

Iron Maiden delivered their best works from 1982 to 1988, precisely from "The Number of the Beast" to "Seventh Son of a Seventh Son." Period....

I believe that the detractors of the '80s can be divided into two groups: either they are too young to have experienced that period, in which case they are excused, or they were too old at the time to adjust in just a few years to the dismantling of the cultural-political-musical establishment of the '70s... Yet, and few remember, the '80s owe a lot to the '70s... They were years when there was a return to the bourgeoisie so strongly opposed in the '70s, but in a more mature, liberal way... They were the years of yuppies, but also of metalheads, they were years of artistic rebirth... Years when there were galleries everywhere, happenings, the years of New York's Transgressive-Chic, of Studio 54, the years of the fall of communism... Much more complex years than one might believe...
And then there was us... Us who? The teenagers of “la Italia bene,” carefree, paninari, who waited for the slow songs in clubs that were still human-sized (or rather, human-friendly), a small sofa, a girl, and in the background “True,” or “Through the barricades”... And it felt great... Vocal and melodic refinements never again proposed by POP music, and I want to emphasize Pop...
I'm sorry for those who experienced that time poorly, perhaps in small towns, perhaps in less affluent families, maybe as a 'tamarro'... But for those like me who lived it in “Milano da bere,” amidst parties, clubs, and multimillion-dollar shopping in the city center, they will always be the fabulous, unrepeatable '80s... and this was our soundtrack...
Then towards the end, when everything was coming to a close, and the clouds of musical counterculture were gathering (the fall of the Berlin Wall, the rise of grunge on one side, techno on the other, and the boy bands properly so-called), I, and many others began to grow our hair long, to dress differently... I, in 1988, started on a new musical journey, starting with the Beatles, a journey that is still ongoing...
However, every time I listen to Spandau (Gold is a masterpiece), I always think of that magical five-year period that ideally stretched from 1983 to 1988... And I get a lump in my throat...
Best regards.

The point is this. Those who weren't 14/15/16 years old during that period will never understand an album like this... They will never understand the rush home from school on Saturday afternoons to watch SuperclassificaShow, or how at 2:00 the DJ Parade would start... Just as those who weren't teenagers in the '60s will never understand those who consumed the records of Elvis, the Beatles, Mina, Caselli, or Patty Pravo... Yes, there were those who listened to Dylan, the Byrds, Jefferson Airplane, or the Piper of the Floyd... BUT not everyone, not in Italy... My mother, who was 30 at that time (there was only an 18-year difference between us), hated Wham and Duran, but listened to Queen's I Want To Break Free or Radio Ga-Ga, which, let’s be clear (I enjoyed them too), were certainly not muuuuuch superior to the Synth Pop groups...

The 1980s were infinitely more musically complex than commonly believed and passed down... And those who pass it down are the pretentious intellectuals of the '70s (typically Italian) who found themselves bewildered by the second musical revolution in the history of POP(ular) music. Just as the explosion began in the late '60s, so did another one at the end of the '70s that led to New Wave, Dark Wave, Dark Rock, Metal (properly speaking), New Romantic, Synth Pop, and then? So much Rock...
So please, let’s not say outrageous nonsense about the '80s, when it was precisely then that bands like Queen filled stadiums, along with Dire Straits, Springsteen, Iron Maiden, Metallica, and many more...
And yes, the birth of Dance music, especially spaghetti Dance, which, like it or not, gave us unforgettable moments, from Ryan Paris to Gazebo, from Den Harrow to Bandoleo...
RIO is a seminal album of that new Synth Pop, New Romantic or better said "New Glam," which, along with some things by: Spandau Ballet, Wham, and others, branded the decade...
However, if you listen to the melodies of that period, the harmonies, after... and I say after, it's hard to say Pop did better, in fact, I would say no... And Careless Whisper, whether you like it or not from the rivals WHAM, is considered perhaps the most beautiful ballad of all time...
Regards

But let’s not say nonsense, please...
First of all, I bumped into Morgan and the Bluvertigo years ago (I’m talking about the late '90s) in a well-known Milanese venue, where Morgan, at the end of dinner, went to retrieve an unmistakable bag from the chef directly, and he was visibly altered...
It was the time of "Metallo non metallo," which was quite a shake-up for those days (along with many other "alternative" bands that emerged back then… I think of Ustmamò, Tiromancino, Fankie Hi Nrg, Agricantus, and many others). A work that reshaped a certain Rock of Battitan memory (forgive the horrid neologism) into Indie and electro Pop... And sorry if that’s not enough, given that during that period the Mainstream offered things of unspeakable ugliness, and even the historic singer-songwriters seemed to be mired. Furthermore, Morgan "reinvented" the figure of the Rocker, new, intellectual, of Anglo-Saxon origin, but with a French-Chic touch, decadent and captivating...
Then, it’s clear that if many of you consider worthy of being called artists only Terry Riley or Captain Beefheart… But what the hell do you want? Go find Scaruffi in his American hermitage and stop being a pain in the ass!!!