4. Epic Ethical Ethnic Pathos
After the release of Canzoni preghiere danze, two fundamental events took place: the fall of the Berlin Wall and the CCCP touring Russia with Litfiba. From the latter event, a new band began to take shape, featuring Gianni Maroccolo on bass, Ringo De Palma on drums, Giorgio Canali on guitar, and Francesco Magnelli on keyboards. Arranged in a circle in a country house playing new songs, this is how EEEP came to exist. The album is ideally divided into four parts, each named with words from the title: the first part, Epic, starts wonderfully with Aghia Sophia, one of the best tracks in the collection, before moving to the Eastern-inspired Paxo de Jerusalem and the interlude Sofia. Ethical immediately changes the rules of the game, with a distorted bass dominating Narko'S, followed by a piano bar moment sung by the people's artist Fatur, before returning to the distorted bass. Next comes an unjustly lesser track in the CCCP discography, such as Campestre, and the funeral of communist ideals in Depressione caspica. Ethnic begins instead with the so-called cover Amandoti (introduced by an interlude called In occasione della festa), the galloping L'andazzo generale, and the intriguing Al Ayam. The third part concludes with Mozzill'o re and a reprise of Campestre. The last and fourth part, Pathos, opens with the colossal Maciste contro tutti, a true manifesto of CCCP thought, and finally collapses into the tear-jerking Annarella, a song that Ferretti dedicated to his father whom he never knew, and named it Annarella due to some health issues that Annarella had during the album's production. In short, this album certainly does not deserve the fourth place in the rankings, let alone the second among CCCP albums, but this time the scales wanted to favor a historic and important record.
Meticulous rating: 10
The gem: Maciste Contro Tutti
(I wanted to choose Annarella as the gem, but I didn't want to inflate its significance further.)