Elliott Murphy
April

Tizio, who for a few months now has been trying to melt my ears by introducing them to musical genres I've never delved into, told me “if you want to go to the concert I mentioned, listen to this”. And I, like a good and timid child who doesn’t want to risk ruining the promised ice cream after dinner, followed his advice for five whole days. With “April”, the name of this plastic disc, we got acquainted, and it wasn't difficult; just a couple of hours to break the ice, and from the first evening, we made passionate love by turning the volume up to a quarter of the dial. Oh yes, maybe we also deserved the out-of-time anger of a broomstick insistently beaten by the spinster upstairs. Amen, we have silently hated each other for a long time.

And so, in the very uncomfortable seat placed in the little plate of a half-empty theater located in the darkest hole of a mountain valley, I felt objectively well-prepared to face the concert. After all, according to Wikipedia, Elliott Murphy only released about thirty albums, and “April” and I have been old lovers who know how to procrastinate and extend our mutual pleasure. Not having yet passed the age of Christ on the cross, I’m among the youngest and I enjoy scanning those who could be my parents, busy fiddling with their cell phones for selfies to post on Facebook as if it were a concert in a stadium full of cheering people. The reality is the squeaking of chairs in need of oil; a noise that bounces off the faded walls. One doesn’t need to pay attention to be hit by the conversations of nearby seats, inhabited by the planet Peacock, eager to divulge their musical omniscience in a generous tone of voice. And I laugh because even if they aren’t teenagers, they are the same kind of people, with the same colorful tails, who filled the dives where I attended the first heavy metal concerts.

The concert I attended doesn’t reach the heights of “April,” but, damn it, twelve coffees (the price requested) Elliott Murphy and Olivier Durand truly earned. Managing to chip away at us, granite blocks and mountain dwellers, and actually making us stand up after two hours of rock ballads is no easy feat. And it's no big deal if the acoustics weren't perfect. The old man exchanged a few words in English with us and signed a couple of records offered at a fair price.

Released in 1999, “April” is said to be Murphy’s second official live album, and it slipped by me with the ease with which one quenches their thirst after a run. I have in mind a photograph of those damned hydrangeas that, during my parents’ vacation, I had to water during the scorching summer just passed. “You're not camels!”, I often reminded them aloud; because I didn’t even have time to empty a watering can before those roots absorbed everything and were ready to receive another dose of H2O. Usually, if something is liked immediately, at first listening, it's hard for it to last over time. Water, as thirst-quenching and good as it is when it bobs down the Adam’s apple, doesn’t have a particular taste and is pissed out without regret in a few hours. “April,” with its excellent sound production, able to find the right balance between guitars and voice, is more akin to a spirit that is sipped with care, savoring it slowly to prolong the taste in the oral cavity. Ahhhh!

The setlist is homogeneous, devoid of fillers, with a couple of successful and energetic external tributes (“Gloria” and “Wild Horses”) and a compact duration. Murphy’s warm voice shines in the simple ballads whose verses, set on delicate arpeggios, crackle like wood not completely dry, thrown into a stove. It's freezing cold up here these days, and songs with simple lyrics, like “Hard Core”, “Rock Ballad”, “You Never Know You’re In For” and “Drive All Night”, warm me up as if I had a steaming mug in my hands. And it's a nice feeling that makes me repeatedly break the continuity of listening to the work in its entirety to step back, slightly raising the volume. I give a crooked smile upstairs.

The live repeatedly offers an imaginary spotlight on Olivier Durand’s fingers in the rhythmic “Take Your Love Away”, “Party Girls & Broken Poets”, “Diamonds By the Yard” and, having seen this musician no more than five meters away, I can say his technique is remarkable and, more importantly, not an end in itself. The peak of the record is “Sicily”: the work of the two guitars instantly conveyed to me the warmth and colors of land scorched by the sun and swept by the wind. Listen to it if you get the chance.

Without dragging out too long an analysis that rests on a rusty and shaky nail, “April” is a quality live album. I recommend listening to it and, if you don’t know the singer in question, maybe at the next concert he gives in Italy, you’ll come to see him play in a squeaky and remote little theater too.