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Rating: Yeah…What do you need a title for? And what is a title?
According to the online dictionary I usually consult, a title is “the name, the short phrase, even fanciful, with which the subject of a piece of writing, a text, a work of art is indicated…”.
“CCTNFDUT” is a gloomy album. It's not so much the tone of the album, which is far from being light and accommodating, but rather the choice of the Lombard trio to approach a series of complex themes highlighting their cruelty and harshness, without giving room for any possibility of rebirth. The opening track, “Non siamo mai stati sulla luna”, bears the marks of renunciation, with that “they lied to us” that tastes like powerless justification in the face of the inconsistency of the stars, the world, of the lifeless life.
And around the drift, there is silence. The famous sleep of reason, someone might say. “L’uomo che non dorme mai” asks the outside world with sad resignation “how can you sleep?”, but the answer doesn’t come. He is nothing but an “ignored angel”. A body whose voice is obscured by “stray bullets”. As we reach the third track, we would expect a glimpse of optimism… We are promptly disproven, but it is a pleasant disproval that the Mercanti grant us.
A blend of pride and disillusionment pervades the story of the protagonist of the track which represents, for the writer, one of the peaks of the album. Listen to trusted ones: “…and we never gave in to sadness, laughing is not showing your teeth but realizing that beauty exists…”. Beauty can be a curse, but it’s worth the risk. The last verse in this sense is emblematic: “…it will be just as easy to stumble, it happens to those who walk and look at the sky”.
The waltz of the “Semi-automatica” takes us to a Fellini-esque world of petty thieves, whores, and the Romagna coastlines. In “L’Italia” the bald head of Paolini pops up and gives a nod to the theatre-song. But behind the cheerful musical choices, the shadows of metropolitan and existential nightmares are more alive and darker than ever. In “Moglie Brontolona” it’s Piero Ciampi who is invoked. Like in a séance, the Livornese responds to the call and the track, incredibly, seems to have been plucked straight from his discography. Here he is: “…I am the king of tressette and I have a heavy hand and I left the imprint of my ring on a lot of people…”. And indeed, the Ciampi of “Confiteor” is this rascal here. Welcome back.
The last tracks talk about human free will, as much as that word can still mean anything. If in the “Chiesa di Bellusco” the choice of the SS commander is to spare the weak Italians gathered in prayer, in “Huntsville” the indifference of the Texan ranger in inflicting the death penalty on the condemned is evident. And his progress is unstoppable.
This concludes a hard and determined album. Grinding teeth. It ends with the sad sensation that not all the protagonists of “CCTNFDUT” are “children and victims of this world”. It rather seems that the current world, so crude and ruthless, has been generated by those who were too long considered lambs. Architects, guilty. That's what we are.
But what do you need a title for if you’ve already said everything? Yeah, what do you gain from it…
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