Einstürzende Neubauten
10-04-2008: Milano, Alcatraz

LA RECENSIONE

No preamble or tales/adventures preceded the concert. Just an idiot who decided to take the bus and half an hour of rain to go listen to the "collapsing buildings." Alone.

The interest was the music, and an hour early, I settled near the barrier, giving up on approaching any of the (sweaty) attendees, but noticing the age and social heterogeneity: I discovered that I was among the youngest in that extremely varied audience.

After three-quarters of an hour lost inside and outside thoughts, which left very little memory, the lights go out and they make their entrance: "Die Wellen."

The percussive crescendo fills my head and I am happy. The timpani begin to vibrate.

They play in succession tracks from the latest and great "Alles Wieder Offen" and some other pieces from the very recent productions. In vain the call of a fan who screams "Meine Seele Brennt" which is answered by Blixa and the crew with "meine auch" amid general giggles. The Neubaten have changed, they are less destructive and more introspective.

Their music is as I expected, but better. All the effects I thought were due to electronic effects are actually performed with their peculiar instruments and the effect is billions of times better than on the record. I can distinguish some car rims, wrenches, pipes and taps of all kinds, gas cans, and a nice hydraulic press (I think).

Industrial waste playing romance.

Blixa jokes between songs, and the security man watches them puzzled: halfway through the concert, he will ask me if I really appreciate what those gentlemen in suits and ties and without shoes are (dis)doing on stage. I nod with satisfaction.

How beautiful they are when they become calm and nocturnal, leading you insidiously into a negative and oppressive spiral, as if submerged by a flood of cement. ("Unvollständigkeit")

How beautiful Hacke's bass when it becomes onomatopoeically noisy: now a jackhammer, now a rusty train... Rarely (only) a bass.

How beautiful when they can't help but make you notice that the setlist is rigid and controversial for the old aficionados, but in the end, they grant you an exceptional encore halfway between theater and improvisation.

"Noise," "industrial": all nonsense. Theirs is simple and pure expression.

It's the exquisitely European cry against the barbarization of the pitch society, which buries problems and questions under tons of lard and cement.

They are like the idealistic youth deprived of the naivete of protest, offering a relaxing catharsis based on electroshock to those who want to be mistreated by reality.

In the end, I even manage to get the bassist to autograph my CD (who to continue with the autographs shouts: "spinello for a working guy!") and I leave the Alcatraz alone and with a smile on my lips.