Fluxus
Pura Lana Vergine

LA RECENSIONE

There was a time, in our poor peninsula, when guitars made wrists tremble. Made ears bleed, heads buzz. There was a time, in our poor peninsula, when it was important to say something. To scream it. To make records because there is an urgency to do something. To set hearts on fire.

"Pura Lana Vergine" will kill you 100 times. It will dry your tears, as it dried mine many years ago. Tears of anger. "Tears of blood". Cried by the Madonna. No record was more relevant than this. No record was more necessary, now. Now that we are without direction, and without protection. Now that we are a country that cries for itself, helpless and frightened, feeling the breath of defeat on its neck. These terrorists from Turin need to be rediscovered. Their Word must resonate in the squares, inside the schools. The noise barrages of the guitars, of the two basses (!), must, FOR GOD'S SAKE, give meaning to everything now. Math applied to revolution.

Listen to these songs. Ride the shiver that will run down your spine. Noise barrage, it has been said. But also squared, frayed, tormented post-hardcore. Also civil, political consciousness. Also devastating power, yet always controlled. Also lyrics that shine. Also melodic flashes that are never trivial.

The time for waiting is over. Because "Things that never change, then change in a very short time". And so we must be ready. 

Franz, we need you. We need your declamatory screams. We need the poetry of "Latte". We need the "Smiling Man", who moves as he knows, free from all rules. We need tunnels to crawl into, tight, narrow, muddy, suffocating, and then we need to come out, out, in the fire, on a beach in Ostia, wondering why.

In the distance, the sirens wail. We laugh, because now we know. 

I don’t want to settle anymore, I don’t want to hear anyone tell me there’s no solution. Your fury will be my answer.

Note: The record is from 1998, released by Edizioni de "Il Manifesto" (I remember it being available at newsstands). The singer Franz Goria later formed Petrol.