Francesco De Gregori
Amore Nel Pomeriggio

Dylanization. Horrendous word, but good for giving an idea of Francesco De Gregori's artistic journey from the mid-'80s to this Amore Nel Pomeriggio (2001), which remains to date his last album of unpublished songs. His love for Bob Dylan has been widely declared since his debut, but the approach to the themes and musical style of the father of singer-songwriters occurs gradually and only after a certain number of albums, where instead the intimate and sentimental side prevails. It is the most classic period, that of the "hermetic" De Gregori, culminating in the masterpiece Rimmel (1975).

But as much as it is scattered here and there with slightly dull episodes, the subsequent phase is also very interesting, one in which the poet finally gets angry because he just can't help it, but he does it as a poet, never giving in to excessively harsh attitudes, and above all always leaving himself the escape route to the imaginative and delicate world of the purity of verses, a real refuge to reach before getting too poisoned by realistic storytelling and merciless denunciation of what's wrong with the world. Dylanization therefore, but never complete, not even in "Amore nel pomeriggio".

It starts immediately with a lot of Dylan: "L'aggettivo Mitico" is a ballad composed of bare but gloomy guitar chords, with bass and drums entering like stones in a glass shop, but above all with torrents of words so precise, pertinent, poisonous, that it is hard to believe that they are being declaimed by De Gregori's calm voice. "Today the wine is poured, the bread is broken two thousand times the rooster sings... Socrates shouts questions in the street and Beato Angelico paints walls in the suburbs...": it's a wonderful "Desolation Row" of the 2000s: classicism and urban decay, biblical curses and environmental disasters. Very tough also "Spad VII S2489", a nice rock with a tight rhythm, reminiscent of Dire Straits. It exposes the cynical point of view of the war pilot, for whom "The earth was a parenthesis between one departure and the next... almost a useless waste of time for things of little importance". How far is the romantic "Pilota Di Guerra" inspired by Saint-Exupéry, the one who "sprinkles salt on the wounds of cities". The more subdued tones and idyllic music of "Natale di Seconda Mano" should not be misleading: the despair of the "last of the world, little match-sellers" emerges powerfully, of those forced to live by getting by "with second-hand documents". Just as "Condannato a Morte" may seem like a carefree, slightly country ballad, but we try to put ourselves in the shoes of its protagonist, whether it's Salman Rushdie or anyone condemned to live forever in terror for religious reasons. "Religion can be terror" may be the discovery of hot water, but it should be branded on some fanatical heads.

But the song that alone justifies the purchase of the album is "Il Cuoco di Salò", and let's say right away that it has nothing Dylan-like about it: classic melody, piano and string orchestra, a motif so inspired and touching it recalls the time of "Donna Cannone". In the beautiful verses, only the point of view of a simple person is revived, a cook, who overwhelmed by events larger than him, found himself serving the fleeing fascist hierarchs ("here Italy is made and dies... on the wrong side you die"). How it was possible to find revisionism in such a text, I can only explain it in two ways: either a series of elaborate sophisms or a robust dose of cretinism. I fear that the second explanation is the right one, however, at the release of this album someone had the nerve to "overtake on the left" De Gregori, and it certainly did not render him a good service. Neither the author, always consistent with his ideas, nor this excellent album deserved it, but stupidity, despite there being someone who yells and agitates to claim its copyright, is actually transversal and its trend is always positive.