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First commandment: find allies against the barbarians.
Under the weight of the mainstream in recent years, we have been subjected to a great binge of proposals that I believe have irreparably compromised what has always been defined as the "Italian songwriting tradition."
Products from talent shows, psycho-teen groups, and the old guards, (Guccini, Fossati, De Gregori) who choose early retirement or a perpetual look of retrospection. Fucking greatest hits...
I'm talking about an album that, in such a context, is inevitably born as a niche work.
"Stelle, Rospi e Farfalloni," by Fabio Curto, is an album I would have definitely missed if I occasionally chose to tune into the frequencies of a well-known local Bologna radio station that gives space to artists who perform live presenting their work. People who try and who, until proven otherwise, do not give up.
The album is an absolute gem, a nocturne composed of such allegorical images that - I bet - they roar of an autobiographical imprint.It begins with the story of the "Rospo Innamorato," which is a love letter full of irony but at the same time permeated by a melancholic aura. It would have been comfortable among the tracks of "Macramé," by Fossati.
Then follows the story of poor Alfonso, doomed to love a nun who was once just a girl he went smoking with, and then the juggler from Poznan who "for a euro does what he knows," the sculptor Omero who, after a life spent in the cold of lonely love becomes a standard-bearer, "consoler of those who have never loved." A beautiful collection of characters that remain etched in the heart and make up the lively human comedy of the album.
"Il Trio dei Farfalloni" is a tribute to Bolognese life, a nocturnal, acoustic ballad, a disenchanted declaration of love for a city that sees its venues closed, where the night is the waiting for a bus, rather than a triumph of youth and - consequently - nightlife.The happiest episodes are, however, those that end the album. "Noè" and "Il Corvo" are the peaks of this album, two tracks that hint at an even greater compositional and interpretative ability by Fabio Curto.
The first is a track imbued with restlessness expressed in the compelling tangle of notes, an epic ride that ends, as in much of the album, in the subdued.
A missed explosion, but a beautiful one."Il Corvo" is the other track that deserves special mention. A vocal progression made of whispers, a climax of emotions narrated with difficulty that ends in an immense, poignant cry:"brother, I feel the gates of hell welded shut treacherously and you're left inside."
The album ends, and you feel like embracing this artist, this Fabio Curto, for the ability with which he has managed to bare himself, hurt himself and give us an album that tastes like poetry.
Perhaps the last work that returned these emotions to me, precisely for this self-destructive tendency but which inevitably leads to beauty, was "Queen of Denmark" by John Grant.
A reconciling album, to be cherished like one of those things that are disappearing. A courageous album that, no matter what, will remain a small beneficent pearl.
And may the mainstream continue to win if on this side of the barrier there are still wolves howling at the moon, solitary but not too much.
Like the bad reputation
it begins with the fingers
with their lies
Raymond Carver
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