Hiroshima Mon Amour
Embryo Tour 2005

THE REVIEW

What is it like to stand in front of a dinosaur, a fantastical creature of which we have only a few fossil remains from a distant past, a time that no longer exists and that we can only vaguely imagine?

It was August 2005, and during my vacation trip along the Adriatic coast, I stumbled upon a black poster with a blue stain in the center announcing a concert of Hiroshima Mon Amour that very evening. With my travel companions, we said to ourselves: why not? The gig was held in a park in Vasto, organized by the local Luna Plena.

When the band took the stage, we were suddenly thrown back to 1980. That sound, that look, those spartan lights... everything combined perfectly to recreate an atmosphere that seemed lost in time. The singer gave very little room for interaction with the audience, even throwing glances at a group of boisterous youngsters gathered nearby, the bassist, enormous, with slow and sinuous movements, the guitarist, composed, carrying much of the harmonic and melodic weight, the drummer very precise and incisive, the keyboardist, fascinating and immobile like a statue, deeply focused on her instrument. An atmosphere that, by comparison, recalled the darker deeds of the New Order from the Taras Shevchenko video.

In the following days, I made a couple of attempts at the record stores in my city to find some of their albums, but nothing. And amidst one thing and another, I forgot about them. Until this year, when I found myself with the CD "Embryo Tour 2005" in my hands. Recorded live about a month after the evening in Vasto, it seems to faithfully reproduce the setlist and confirms my impressions of a band immersed body and soul in the new wave of the '80s. New wave at times contaminated by punk (Anno zero, Fuga dall'Eden), gothic (La casa, Cambio), and psychedelia (Eclissi). Two exquisite covers: Siberia by Diaframma and Play for today by The Cure. The recording is excellent for being a local live, doing justice to the band's abilities and bringing prestige to Italian independent rock.

Hiroshima Mon Amour are the last specimens of an extinct race.
Like dinosaurs, indeed.