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Rating: A year after the enormous success of Rimmel, De Gregori releases Bufalo Bill, one of his most unique albums, but also, according to him, the one that resembles him the most. Rich with ideas, both in the music and the lyrics, it is exuberant in execution and singing but might have benefited from better arrangement and production. Apart from this small flaw, it is a high-level record, with various frescoes, characters, and situations that come together to form a single thematic painting.
The entire album is indeed permeated by a critical spirit towards society, primarily the American one, which controls and influences people through conventions and interests.
"Bufalo Bill" is America encompassed between the myth of the frontier and the economic boom of the early 1900s, seen through the eyes of one of its legendary characters, who perfectly embodied its spirit. The structure of the song is not linear but consists of many different vignettes that come together in the grand finale. Almost a suite, if we want to stretch the definition a bit.
"Giovane Esploratore Tobia", written together with Dalla, retains his musical style and singing. A funny little portrait, another character who does not command his life but is commanded by others and conventions.
"L'Uccisione di Babbo Natale" is an amoral tale, where "the son of the flower child" together with "Dolly, daughter of miners" meet and kill a Santa Claus "loaded with iron and coal" and then return to their parents. Perhaps the fake bourgeois and the proletarian who kill the bourgeoisie and then return to it or more simply the dramatic farewell to childhood and the myth of Santa Claus.
"Ninetto e la Colonia" takes place in a cinema, during a marine raid; they shoot everyone, then some officials in suits and ties come in and take away all the fruits that belonged to Ninetto and his friends. The song refers to American agro-industrial multinationals that have taken over all the plantations in Central and South America.
"Disastro Aereo sul Canale di Sicilia" deals with a news event, a NATO plane fallen in those waters.
"Ipercarmela" depicts a social snapshot typical of the era: in an industrialized city, two immigrants live their lives through the myth of owning a house and women's magazines. In this apathetic squalor, a baby is born, Carmela, a star in a city "clean and violent", who always laughs and never cries.
"Ultimo Discorso Registrato" is fun and rhythmical, but one has no idea what it means. "Festival" is instead dedicated to the sad end of Luigi Tenco at the San Remo of '67, and the disgraceful world surrounding the event.
Just deviating from the theme that supports the whole record, we arrive at the two jewels of the work. "Atlantide", the only love song, is rich with suggestive and original images, characterized by a dreamy and suffering atmosphere.
"Santa Lucia", on the other hand, is a secular, universal prayer, for everyone, splendid without ever falling into rhetoric, filled with evocative and moving images. It is dedicated to those who do not see the obvious things, the important things, winners and losers, portrayed with a loving and sweet gaze. The concluding passage is both the frame and the best brushstroke of the painting, the masterstroke that elevates the entire album. The tones of irony and drama used so far are softened in a disarming sweetness, and they bid us farewell with a strong emotion from this beautiful and challenging record.
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
01 Bufalo Bill (04:29)
Il paese era molto giovane,
i soldati a cavallo era la sua difesa.
Il verde brillante della prateria
dimostrava in maniera lampante l'esistenza di Dio,
del Dio che progetta la frontiera e costruisce la ferrovia.
A quel tempo io ero un ragazzo
che giocava a ramino, fischiava alle donne.
Credulone e romantico, con due baffi da uomo.
Se avessi potuto scegliere tra la vita e la morte,
tra la vita e la morte, avrei scelto l'America.
Tra bufalo e locomotiva la differenza salta agli occhi:
la locomotiva ha la strada segnata,
il bufalo può scartare di lato e cadere.
Questo decise la sorte del bufalo,
l'avvenire dei miei baffi e il mio mestiere.
Ora ti voglio dire: c'è chi uccide per rubare
e c'è chi uccide per amore,
il cacciatore uccide sempre per giocare,
io uccidevo per essere il migliore.
Mio padre guardiano di mucche,
mia madre una contadina.
Io, unico figlio biondo quasi come Gesù,
avevo pochi anni e vent'anni sembran pochi,
poi ti volti a guardarli e non li trovi più.
E mi ricordo infatti un pomeriggio triste,
io, col mio amico 'Culo di gomma', famoso meccanico,
sul ciglio di una strada a contemplare l'America,
diminuzione dei cavalli, aumento dell'ottimismo.
Mi presentarono i miei cinquant'anni
e un contratto col circo Paceebene
a girare l'Europa.
E firmai, col mio nome e firmai,
e il mio nome era Bufalo Bill.
06 Atlantide (03:41)
Lui adesso vive ad Atlantide
con un cappello pieno di ricordi;
ha la faccia di uno che ha capito
e anche un principio di tristezza in fondo all'anima,
nasconde sotto il letto un barattolo di birra disperata
e a volte ritiene di essere un eroe.
Lui adesso vive in California da sette anni
sotto una veranda ad aspettare le nuvole
e' diventato un grosso suonatore di chitarra
e stravede per una donna chiamata Lisa;
quando le dice tu sei quella con cui vivere
gli si forma una ruga sulla guancia sinistra;
lui adesso vive nel terzo raggio
dove ha imparato a non fare piu' domande del tipo:
conoscete per caso una ragazza di Roma
la cui faccia ricorda il crollo di una diga?
Io la conobbi un giorno ed imparai il suo nome
ma mi porto' lontano il vizio dell'amore.
E cosi' pensava l'uomo di passaggio
mentre volava alto nel cielo di Napoli
rubatele pure i soldi rubatele anche i ricordi
ma lasciatele per sempre la sua dolce curiosita'
ditele che l'ho perduta quando l'ho capita
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Other reviews
By giores
"Bufalo Bill is my cross and delight: ... I did it bare and essential, to punish myself for having made Rimmel which had sold too much... crazy stuff!"
"Santa Lucia, the album’s closure, is a splendid piano-voice piece, a secular prayer supported by sincere and immense phrases."
By killrockstar76
"Bufalo Bill is the album De Gregori himself prefers, the one he has always considered the most complete, ambitious."
"With Bufalo Bill he delegitimizes his accusers who saw in him only a boy with good readings, too attached to his ‘myths’... but just Francesco De Gregori."
By withor
'Bufalo Bill' is this cross and delight of mine: well, if I could, I would probably redo it with better attention to sounds and arrangements.
All that was missing was the castor oil…
