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Rating: They say it had to be done by contract. Just as they say that the humblest compilation or live album might have sufficed. Or, perhaps, the most disarming jumble of rehashed hits.
He, Francuzzo, did everything - and nothing - of that.
He crafted an album that, let's say right away, listens well, very well, from start to finish and multiple times.
It's not the first time he's mixed old and new things (already "Mondi Lontanissimi" was like that, and it was beautiful), but it's the first time he's mixed all his "light" styles and experiences, creating a sort of "best/unreleased", quite unique and decidedly successful.
First of all, the title track, in the wake - for him as happy as it is numerically reduced - of the invectives.
An ideal follow-up to "Povera Patria", "Inneres Auge" perfectly captures the time we are living in.
If "Povera Patria" exuded, in every sad note and in every well-placed, studied word, the dramatic disillusionment of the decline of the so-called first republic, the pentapartito and the worst DC, this "Inneres Auge" ruthlessly, brilliantly and perfectly photographs the Berlusconi era. Without discounts and without hermeticism or sophistry. Here everything is clear, nothing is random, everything is highly recognizable and the result of the grand, austere and unshakeable intuition that the Master has firmly in mind. He does not want to leave room for alternative, benevolent or misleading interpretations. Here, I repeat, there is no hermeticism. The piece is very clear and beautiful, both literarily and musically, which is rare for invectives and especially for such "immediate" tracks.
The video is also highly recommended. For obvious reasons, you never see it on TV, just as the track is rarely played on the radio (only, obviously, on the usual stations) and never on television, in any form (how often do you hear, say, the awful Mika in the background of any news piece or similar rubbish?).
As confirmation.
For the rest, the album alternates old and new things, the so-called "B sides" (although unfortunately now physically nonexistent), high and very high episodes (the version of "Tibet", for instance, is chilling).
Returning to not very famous songs is a wise choice in itself, although I must say (perhaps due to an excess of affection towards the originals) that I do not entirely agree with the superiority, as many claim, of these versions. The fact remains that Battiato still manages to evoke emotion, he does not know and does not want to trivialize, and he always believes in what he does. And even hearing today's renditions of past pages again, with him, seems to have the meaning that with other authors, almost always, it has not had.
This album, with its ancient length (the old 46-minute cassette...), flies by beautifully and leaves a pleasant taste. A nice aftertaste.
Battiato's last album, so far, is and remains the splendid and emblematic "Il Vuoto". It is the last true project, the last work with a capital "W". And I think he would agree with this premise. But this small episode, which however hosts a track inevitably destined to make history, is truly an unexpected pleasure.
A pleasantly sorrowful yet very powerful light in the now cadaverous panorama of widely disseminated national singer-songwriting.
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