Jovanotti
La Mia Moto

At the dawn of the 90s, one might have even found hordes of studs standing still, boiling under the sun, a sea of smelly and scruffy young people in the fields; it was called Monsters of Rock. Here, the main activities, dividing us from the pathos and adrenaline of the late evening, could today be summarized - in a pre-digital age, pre-mobile phone, pre-social media - in eating rubbery sandwiches, laughing, queuing at the plastic toilets, and smoking the grass of those August-yellowed Emiliano fields.

The long and boring wait was sometimes interrupted by a collective ritual serving to affirm belonging to a cult, to make us realize and believe that we and only we were undoubtedly on the right side. The collective catharsis usually took place with a rhythmic "chi non salta Jovanotti è" or with more prosaic chants like "Jovanotti vaffanculo".

Nonetheless, I might say today, Jovanotti was spectacularly innocent. The villagers of the gothic village, armed with torches, seeking the monster to kill it, clearly should have stopped the real culprit first, Doctor Frankenstein, that is, the one who created the creature. And you understand that we are talking about the thirty-eight-year-old at the time, Cecchetto, an authentic mad scientist who shaped his Golem in every way, starting with the sticky and clear choice of naming him Jovanotti. But who are these young gentlemen? The young men are the healthy, robust boys, with strong values, perhaps even a bit simple-minded, who are by definition young men in the sense of "young men" so wise as to behave like small adults. Not for nothing, young man is the term also used to refer to an old man who looks youthful. Young man indicates someone who appears as he is not, as he should not be by nature.

The young men Cecchetto addresses don’t do drugs, don’t drink, listen to their mothers, love to party, and their greatest depravity is turning up the volume.

"La mia moto", the second album, is far worse than the previous one, "Jovanotti for president" (and this says a lot) because here it was chosen to speak Italian, and programmatically Cecchetto abandons the pseudo-rap vehicle aimed at thirteen-year-olds to communicate directly to his young men, always the same ones, now two years older and beginning to have their first stories. The idea they want to pass is that you can be high and alternative, even have a rock attitude, being like Vasco (openly evoked in the album) without therefore doing like him. But in the end it comes out a world that doesn’t exist, overly sweetened, made of very low values that not even Moccia dreams about, a world where sex, which is entering the lives of these young men, can only be implicit, suggestive, and masked through puns and imaginative allusions in the lyrics.

The world, in short, is that fake and plastic one that precisely Cecchetto's generation nurtured and built in the 80s, the paninaro generation where the important thing is to appear and not to be, the empty one of Ellis's American Psycho, the ruthless one of Gordon Gekko in Wall Street. America and its icons, its clichés, are always the reference to aspire to (it’s evident already from the cover) and as it was for the Milanese fast food almost ten years earlier now, our mad scientist, skillful and attentive, is shaping his Frankenstein on the young men of the 90s.

Musically the album is completely null, obviously irrelevant. The rhythm section, cheap electronic, only repeats bum-bum-cha, bum-bum-cha throughout the album. The guitar, the one giving the rock and rebellious turn, is a light little mosquito - maybe Nikki played it, who on Deejay Television handled hard rock, what times - and the rest is nothing, including of course Jovanotti's voice.

As said, it is indeed the lyrics that are the most interesting part, from the beginning it makes clear that it’s not just a record being listened to but entering a group, with its rules and philosophy, the spirit of aggregation is fundamental among young men:

"I am Jovanotti, the leader of the band
if you want to be one of us you have to apply"

"Because we are a band we’re like a class
but our teachers are our speakers"

Young men love to have fun and party like crazy but always innocently, candidly, they are simple young men, having fun with little, and always keeping in mind the limits of good manners, society, and decency:

"We like girls who don’t act snobby"

"Go on, it’s cool because such a story has never been
that we kill ourselves, have fun, act foolish"

"No Vasco, no Vasco, I’m not falling for it"

"But the best guys, is when we manage
to feel good even when we’re not out and about"

The rebellion is always minimal, subdued, suffocated, pure, and without consequences:

"Handkerchief around my neck and an angry look
for me a medium beer and an ice cream for you"

"Dress like fools and act wild
say swear words be far away" (from parents who sleep away for one night note)

"Even if mom says it can’t be done
I want to pump more;
I have to pump more"

"And if someone comes
like good boys
we’ll lower the volume"

"Oh, mom tonight I’m going out taking the bike, yes, but without a helmet
yes, I’m careful, I’m not crazy, it’s all good, go!"

The sexual metaphor is however always present, nuanced but present, suggestive, mischievous games and double entendres emerge. Sex is beginning to enter the lives of young men:

"I feel the most pumped
dude there is."

"When I’m on top of her
it’s really my party"

"I enjoy it
I enjoy it
taking things the right way"

"We pump at a hundred thousand, we sweat hard
and before we finish we take everything off"

"Tonight I want to have a party
me and my girl
Give me a kiss, come on
Where?
Come on where? You know"

"And I have fun when I’m with you
and we make up a lot of strange things
and then do whatever we like
so stop acting like a mom
once you’re old you’ll have time to as well"

"Let’s go for a walk
if I were you, I’d be up for it."

The lyrics are, as you have read, disarmingly simple in structure and language. There is no poetics. The message must be clear, never cryptic, everything must be in the open, even the metaphors. Twenty years have passed and many things have changed, we are all older guys... And you, back then, where were you? Pumping because it’s cool or were you among the dusty, exhausted ones sleeping in stations before going home?