Cicciolina
Muscolo Rosso

An old winter Saturday evening in a provincial bar. Juke-box speakers blasting at an exorbitant volume with a track by Cannibal Corpse, a filthy and greasy table with a soggy beer mat on top, surrounded by a handful of chronic listless folks gazing into nothingness through the lingering smoke. Did I paint a picture of desolation? Good. The evening needs a jolt, a diversion, something to spark curiosity, after all it takes little... Such a diversion appears in the hands of a friend of mine who, beaming like a twelve-year-old after his first ejaculation, plants the headphones of the mp3 player in my ears. Astonishment and hilarity pervade my soul: I was listening for the first time to the single "Muscolo Rosso" by the well-known didactic actress Ilona Staller, known as Cicciolina, whom, inexplicably, I had never had the pleasure to hear.

There is little to say about Cicciolina. Or is there? Hungarian origins, model at a very young age, she moved to Italy just after coming of age where she met photographer Riccardo Schicchi with whom she hosted a sex-themed show on a private Roman radio station where she called everyone with the diminutive "cicciolini", some parts in a few erotic and non-erotic films at the end of the seventies, first public nude in Italy, first bare breast on our then moralistic television and an LP dated 1979 in full pop-disco style with even a piece by Ennio Morricone and lyrics by Mogol. The turning point occurred in the eighties when, with her now mentor Riccardo Schicchi, she founded the production and management company "Diva Futura", diving headfirst (and I would add something else) into the hardcore porn cinema altogether.

The album I propose to you, dear youngsters with a sprained wrist, is the second 12-inch of our favorite, reaching the peak of an artistic career (and not only) of considerable respect, as you surely well know... The album indeed was released in 1987 at the height of her popularity and after her election, in 1986, to the Chamber of Deputies with the Radical Party, second in preferences only to the leader Marco Pannella. Was the album released, we were saying? Not exactly. Let’s proceed in order. The single that gave the album its name was released all over Europe except in Italy due to our home censorship which maliciously decided to deprive us of such a masterpiece. Elsewhere, instead, it was a fair success, especially in France from where clandestine copies arrived at certainly not negligible prices. The luckiest of all were the Spaniards who were the only ones in Europe to enjoy the entire 12-inch album. Yes, because, inexplicably, the record in question was released only in Spain.

"Muscolo Rosso" (1987) - LP - Boy Records, mission: bring pornography to music. The album is, in fact, explicit like few: no beating around the bush and straight to the point, like in hardcore movies, indeed. A musical orgy among moans, sighs, invocations to the male member, and the exaltation of various and pleasant practices including cunnilingus, pissing, bondage, and fellatio. It ranges from hymns to transgression like "Inno (Come un Angelo)" with partly blasphemous lyrics ("A hymn to transgression - it’s like an angel running down the street - splashes on my face and flies away") partly passionate ("I feel the fire burning my veins... lust, my secret vice that rubs and screws me from behind") to self-quotation of "Telefono Rosso" (it's the title of one of her films, for those who don’t know) through to the sado-maso sex of "Black Sado" with the slow pace of a whip crack to set the song's rhythm, the libertine libertarian hymn "Nirvana" (that is the peace of the senses, to be achieved with obvious and various practices), and the four minutes of moans and invocations on electronic cacophonies of "Perversion". But there is also the pacifist anthem! It’s "Russians" where, in a historical moment such as perestroika, Ilona stands as a global champion of Peace thanks to the power of Love against atomic bombs and nuclear wars. Then there’s "Goccioline", a track as irritating as few with a background that calling it mawkish is an understatement and Cicciolina's dreamy lolita voice (which is unbearably excessive) extolling how pleasant it is to urinate on each other.

The apex is reached with a trio of songs that I wouldn't hesitate to define seminal for every good trash music enthusiast. On my personal podium, I place at number three the cover of "Satisfaction" by the Rolling Stones with slightly different lyrics... At number two "Animal Rock": an intro in "Nella vecchia fattoria" style where cute little animals like the mysterious "Cazzo con Tre Palle" are mentioned and then off with a little tune that sticks in your brain firmly with its neighs and barks. Obviously, at number one is the big floor-filler single "Muscolo Rosso" urging not to sit idle ("hey you, who looks like a mannequin: pull out the hard c...: I’ll give you a blowj...") and which opens with the necessary (for her) audacity of someone newly elected to Parliament feeling, thanks to immunity, authorized to do anything ("After my transgressions, after all these emotions, no one can stop me, you cannot arrest me").

Final note: the music is composed by the ubiquitous Jay Horus, author of all the tracks and music for the live shows of the starlings of "Diva Futura" agency (therefore also author of the entire discography of Moana Pozzi, but I could talk about this in the future).
If you want to have one, a hundred, a thousand laughs and lift your spirits a bit, this is the ideal album. A real Prozac in twelve-inch vinyl. Don’t expect hormonal bursts because the whole thing, music + lyrics + vocal performance, is excessively overdone, initially causing amazement then hilarity, even the moans that in other contexts would have triggered your passion for Solitary.