Gazebo Penguins
Nebbia

If we could make other people disappear, would we erase suffering?

I remember that almost five years ago, the Gazebo Penguins instantly won me over with that little gem that is Senza di te. Back then, their second album in Italian, "Raudo," had already been released. So, I decided to listen to it along with "Legna." The listen was disappointing, and the tracks I now replay with genuine pleasure from those two albums are just a couple. A cerebral post-hardcore reminiscent of Refused without the true inspiration and especially without the genuine spontaneity of the Swedes.

A couple of months before the release of Febbre, the first single from "Nebbia," I was quite indifferent to this track; I thought of it as the usual departure with post-rock sounds that almost every band, even those hardcore, have encountered in the last two or three years. But instead, finally, the Gazebo Penguins have found the right formula, no longer with the sharp structures of Legna or the gritty riffs of Raudo. A balanced mix of post-hardcore songs with post-rock intros and interludes, the tracks are all on the same level, and fundamentally, the italicized sentence above, which Gazebo used to describe Febbre, summarizes the mood of the album. Perhaps this is why I have always liked Senza di te, because it speaks of absence, which is the key theme of this album.

The stone of Bismantova gives the title to the opening track, which talks about a person who has passed away, and some research on this mountain reveals it is a place that has witnessed several suicides. Nebbia and Febbre talk about how difficult it is to fill a void and how easy it is for this void to be filled by those who were there before. Porta is an anthem to be sung at the top of your lungs with clenched fists. These are the tracks that struck me the most, but the rest of the album is equally deserving, and I believe I will love it even more as I continue listening. Not a work of maturity, nor a complex work, but despite the heaviness of the theme, it slips off leaving you melancholically satisfied.