Lucio Battisti
La batteria, il contrabbasso, eccetera

Lucio Battisti was at that time immersed in a series of trips and musical research that first took him to South America (and hence Anima latina), then to the United States, and thus this strange album was born that not everyone understood at the time, as it anticipated by about a year what would become the trend of the moment in Italy, disco music or "four-on-the-floor," as it is called.

It must be said that Lucio always had his ears keenly tuned to everything happening in the music field, and to what might still happen, and this is demonstrated in this 1976 album where he gives vent to his belief that “songs are like punch cards to be inserted into a computer (at that time, computers used punch cards, and today few rare specimens still exist). If you make a mistake with the rhythm in the perforation, the card will be spat out by the machine and people will never hear either the music or the words.”
The first track itself, which was also the single, is a shining example. "Ancora tu," a track very suited for clubs back then, where a colloquial singing style serves as the background to a sound carpet punctuated by bass and drums. The album is indeed called La batteria, il contrabbasso, eccetera to highlight the supremacy of the rhythm section compared to the rest of the other instruments, not to diminish their importance, on the contrary, but precisely to confirm this belief that had already peeked out in the previous album Anima latina, especially in “Due mondi.”
"Un uomo che ti ama" is a beautiful song that had, among other things, appeared a month earlier in Bruno Lauzi's version, with the pivotal moment of the "sorriso trasparente come la tua bella fronte, oh no! L’offerta del tuo seno orgoglio dell’animale sano, oh no!". "La compagnia" is a reprise of an old piece from Marisa Sannita's repertoire, among the few songs sung by him and not written by him (Mogol-Donida).
"Io ti venderei" refers, both in general atmosphere, with the Eminent, and in line-up, to the Anima latina sessions, from which it was evidently excluded because it was not very relevant to that album.
"Dove arriva quel cespuglio" is rather weak, while then comes a sort of conceptual piece in two tracks, "Respirando," where it talks about a car accident where he apparently dies and imagines his “her” at the funeral, while a sudden awakening occurs in "No dottore" where he discovers that it was her who died in the accident.
Then comes the standout track of the album, "Il veliero," a piece that will prove to be way ahead of its time and goes far beyond the disco music atmospheres, even similar to certain '90s house atmospheres. What makes the whole piece successful is the almost hypnotic progression of bass and drums, with vocals entering after more than two minutes.
To close the album, there's a very brief, but delightful, acoustic version of "Ancora tu," almost wanting to show how this album could have been very different if played only with acoustic instruments.

The cover is also legendary, with Lucio cheerfully splashing in a puddle.
An album that should certainly be reevaluated and listened to attentively, if only to not miss certain bass lines.