Massimo Volume
Stanze

THE REVIEW

1993: debut year of the Bologna-based group led by Emidio Clementi, Massimo Volume, just one name among many, no one would have expected the impact they would have on the Italian independent scene for the entire following decade.
"Stanze," released by the small Underground Records, is indeed a raw album and certainly not yet fully mature, but it already shows what will be the distinctive features of Mimì & associates: torn and shredded sound structures, a sort of grunge/noise deconstructed and reconstructed from an extremely personal perspective, thanks especially to the genius of Egle Sommacal (now Ulan Bator); a continuous sense of lack and dissatisfaction, perpetually balancing between implosions and explosions of anguish; but above all, that singing that isn't really singing (you can still perceive slight hints of vocal melodic lines, thanks especially to Vittoria's vocal counterpoints), an inimitable trademark, pure literature: songs like paintings of an absurd and opaque world, stories of marginalization, misunderstanding, and incommunicability, often experienced firsthand, told with a disillusioned voice and therefore even more true, sincere, and penetrating, which is enough to hear once to imprint it indelibly in the brain.

They certainly don't reach the heights later achieved with "Lungo i Bordi" and "Da Qui," but there are nonetheless several episodes more than noteworthy, such as the energetic 'Ronald Thomas e io', the dry and disarming 'Alessandro', the hypnotic 'Veduta dallo Spazio'; and also 'Stanze Vuote', which oozes sick despair from every pore, and 'Cinque Strade', which is heavily influenced by the guitar technique of Umberto Palazzo, one of the band's founders before forming his Santo Niente, another fundamental star of the Emilia capital.

Not their best album, but this is where it all began... pure poetry.