Ivano Fossati
Dal Vivo Volume 2: Carte Da Decifrare

An album that fascinates, captivates, surprises, suddenly transporting the listener onto a secluded seat in the theater to allow themselves to be gently entranced by that blend of music and words created by a Fossati in a state of grace.

I believe that this live album, along with the equally extraordinary Volume 1, also released in 1993, represents the interpretative pinnacle of this artist who today is identified with songs like "Cara Democrazia", which always feel rather jarring, but I don't want to delve into the controversial search for lightness that characterizes this latest period of his and which I personally hope ends here.

Let's return to the seat and the subdued atmosphere of the theater, because these recordings magically allow us to, and it's Fossati himself who writes in the album’s liner notes that "the recordings contained in this album have not been subjected to any post-processing but are a faithful testimony, for better or for worse, of what our forces allowed us in front of the audience at the Teatro Amilcare Ponchielli, in the city of Cremona, on the evenings of March 2 and 4, 1993".

And the evocative power that all this elicits is immense.

So let’s relax and allow ourselves to become, at least for a while, completely permeable to the emotions...

It begins with Lindbergh and his solitary crossing of the Atlantic Ocean where "difficult is not leaving against the wind, but perhaps without a goodbye"; one gets electrified with a rhythmic "Discanto" that concludes with a splendid instrumental coda of piano and drums. And then off with "L'uomo coi capelli da ragazzo" which has that initial refrain that already takes you by the hand and brings you close to the sensibility of those who do not have our reason and perhaps precisely for this retains their "boyish hair" and is there waiting for you to come pick him up one Sunday "to see what a beautiful sea there is". Again "J'adore Venise" where in a atmospheric encounter "the motives of a man are not good to verify" and then "La casa"; "Italiani d'Argentina" which here seems to reach its right musical form and the famous "Canzone popolare".

At this point, already within the complete involvement created by music of rare refinement, a sort of trilogy on love appears, the true one, the deeply and viscerally felt one without frills and unnecessary sentimentalism, which takes shape with "Carte da decifrare", an unreleased and beautiful track "because love is all cards to decipher and long nights and days to calculate, if love is all signs to guess, forgive me if I didn't have time to learn, if I didn't have time to learn". And then is presented "a old song with a brand new outfit" i.e., "E di nuovo cambio casa" where "I change position and apologize, yes... but here there is no one like me" and still "La costruzione di un amore" which has never reached the completeness, the essentiality, and the strength to say that "the construction of a love breaks the veins of the hands, mixes the blood with sweat if you have any left" but is still "like an altar of sand in the middle of the sea". And this odyssey of feelings ends with "La volpe" and "La musica che gira intorno", a track that concludes by declaring that "it will be the music that goes around, the one with no future, it will be the music that goes around, it will be us who have a damned wall in our head" and let’s hope that Fossati keeps these words well in mind, lightness notwithstanding.