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Rating: Guccini, De Andrè, De Gregori, Fossati, Ron, Bobby Solo... when, in sports bars, on Monday morning, between a brioche and a cappuccino, the conversation turns to the great Italian singer-songwriters, these artists I mentioned are always remembered and debated, but often the smaller realities are forgotten, those who, quietly, have carved out their own very personal space in the history of Italian music.
Among these, we find a genuine, multifaceted talent unjustly relegated to the B league of singer-songwriter music: I'm talking about Franco Simone, the terrible enfant-terrible, who seemed destined for great things from his overwhelming beginnings, made of various participations in communion receptions, baptisms, weddings, and bachelor parties. Success was confirmed with the incredible victory at the Castrocaro Festival in '72 and the consequent participation in Sanremo, a festival that countries like Sri Lanka and Trinidad & Tobago envy us, being one of the few "real" global competitions capable of launching great authors onto the world stage.
Unfortunately, however, the dream shattered at the dawn of the '80s when our Franco failed to rival the new musical styles like NWOBHM, new-wave, soft-core, etc... not due to incapacity or lack of inspiration, but rather because of his record label "InvestimentiSicuri Records, Inc." (listed on the stock exchange) which went bankrupt due to the famous stock market crash of '82, leaving our hero stranded, without a penny to produce records that match the competition.
The oblivion and decline of this artist lasted until 2005, when, showing great intuition, he seized a great opportunity, namely participation in the talent show "Music Farm" on Raidue, which in fact relaunched his name to the mainstream audience. Moreover, victory slipped through his fingers due to a glaring error by the judges, who, due to a typo, voted for his elimination instead of that of the same-named Simone, a mediocre filler artist.
Anyway, from the program, Franco benefited greatly, so much so that Italian RCA decided to sign him, first releasing this extraordinary unlimited edition box set that retraces his thirty-year career, where the average-lanum user can really recover so much beautiful forgotten music of ours.
Intimate and pessimistic songs like "With Closed Eyes and Tightly Clenched Fists" or wild violin jams like "Breath" filled with tribal sounds, are absolute excellences of our music, as are "The Railway" and "Dream of the Gallery" which are great examples of auteur music. But there's really so much, so much on the grill in this record: who among you does not remember the explosive "It Exploded in My Mind" or the hallucinatory psychedelic dream of "This Strange Thing," improbable account of a ménage à trois, man-woman-baboon; a song covered by everyone, which then means by no one. "The Key" with that pulsing bass and well-orchestrated backing vocals was the soundtrack of the most exciting moments of the same-titled Tinto Brass film; "The Sky in a Room" instead, Kurt Cobain must have listened to it well: listen to the intro, practically a photocopy of the riff of "Smells Like Teen Spirit" (also noteworthy is that this song was written by three hands with Mogol). The album then is an endless succession of precious gems, but it's probably with the finale that one remains pleasantly enraptured: "Again Her" is perhaps his strong piece, the classic ace up the sleeve, here taken (the song) from the famous live "Live At Piano Bar, Verona-1978," sung in involving playback.
Well, Franco Simone guys, just the name would suffice or rather should suffice: an artist unjustly underestimated, not least by a snobbish, Scaruffi-like critique that has always refused to recognize the merits of this artist with the lowercase 'a'.
To dust off.
Tracklist
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