Patrizio Fariselli
Lupi sintetici e strumenti a gas

Premise: so, perhaps a couple of things should be said to better frame the review of "Lupi sintetici"; I think I can "dare so much" because AREA has formed the DNA of mine and much of my generation. Whether we like it or not. Whether you liked them or not, my dear peers. Reviewing or commenting on an AREA record or one of its members is, for me, a bit like having to review "your own mom": she is indeed a human being with positives and negatives, in the eyes of strangers, but for you as her child it's something unique, pure love: one of a kind and sacred.

I don't perceive (quite blindly and uncritically) any flaw in the conception and writing of the tracks, in the possible naivety, in the execution of some musical and lyrical proposals of the group which remains for me the center of the "big bang" of my personal musical universe, along with Weather Report, Joni Mitchell, Zappa, Perigeo, and very few others. Moreover, it should be said that at the time of the group's formation, there was certainly no intent of belonging to some musical movement: prog, fusion, hard rock, or any other fuss. The project was born around Fariselli (a classically trained keyboardist, talented enough to cause immediate awe without injected substances) and the late "monstrous" Giulio Capiozzo. About four years ago, shortly before he died of a heart attack walking by the seafront in Rimini next to Patrizio and Fariselli Jr., I had the pure joy of exchanging a couple of trivial chats with Claudio, following his presence in my small town for a concert as a sideman for George Cables (historical USA pianist, once a member of the Jazz Messengers who always had a close relationship with Giulio). I remember the only thing I could say, like an idiot, was... "God bless you!" Incredible! How stupid! He reciprocated, however, like a true gentleman, with a nice mocking smile, wide, grateful and sincere, sincere in inversely proportional manner to his raven-black hair... plainly painted!!!

For a long time, there were also "rusts" between Ares Tavolazzi and Giulio, but fundamentally such an intense experience as the AREA story changes your life and that of the fans into whose hearts you've entered. In '77 (if I'm not mistaken) at the Tendastrisce theater on the Colombo in Rome I saw Tavolazzi play a fretless Jazz Bass for the first time and it was him who advised me to remove the frets giving me some tips on how to do it. Enough; to return a little "to the topic", I'm sorry to see "surreal" reviews on AREA and I keep away from them because I think it's a bit like wanting to forcibly stick your nose into something of which perhaps you only perceive the "ghost" from a distance but not the true essence. The records, though wonderful and available today, do not fully convey the sensation of the global AREA phenomenon of those years.

I think that the first 5 official albums of the group should be purchased en masse without hesitation, then Areazione, Parigi-Lisbona, and Teatro Uomo. It’s no coincidence that my musician nephew, having heard something at home, copied here and there, then did exactly what I've just said, starting to buy the original records! The solo by Tofani on "Nervi scoperti" already alone represents the highly advanced musical conception and the incredibly high preparation compared to the average of the time of these guys, already thirty years ahead at the time, albeit with technical means still fairly limited: I fondly remember Tavolazzi's terrible FBT amp and their efforts to buy or obtain however decent or innovative instruments, despite the current opinion at the time about... free music and the consequent lack of money, also due to extremely courageous and uncompromising musical choices: in "L'abbattimento dello Zeppelin" you perceive the riff of "Whole lotta love" overturned by Tofani as a symbolic devastation of the current taste !!! Terrible nostalgia: Gong, Muzak, Linus (is it still there?). The choice, then, of leaving the "western modus vivendi" to enter Hare Krishna made by Paolo Tofani, constitutes the cue for the title of the last studio album "1978: gli Dei (Tofani in the religious trip) se ne vanno, gli arrabbiati (Fariselli/Tavolazzi/Capiozzo/Stratos)" restano.

Looking back, the life of these great musicians is only worthy of a big nostalgic and satisfied smile. If, as it is said, "love ignores defects, friendship adores them", AREA are for us fifty-year-olds only friends. Forever. Only today can I manage to understand and accept EVERYTHING they have done and produced musically: the exploration of the AREA musical world, in fact, SHOULD UNDOUBTEDLY BE COMPLETED with the purchase first of "AREA II" and "AREA II - CITY SOUND" which include inspired young "sober" and "non-smoking" talents around the always damned and pissed Capiozzo, the only original survivor, for a sound now fairly integrated into the mechanisms of a quiet, classy world music. Still beautiful; (given who AREA were, after all?). A separate mention would also deserve Tic&Tac, still very beautiful, and Chernobyl 7991 (Capiozzo-Fariselli) which is truly an (successful) attempt to partially rediscover the original AREA spirit. Beautiful and poignant swan song. The most moving piece is the keyboard and percussion duo in which Patrizio and Claudio dialogue with no one else around, almost to say "we are still here to bother you; we are now only two, with some more aches and pains but with so much oblique music inside to express".

Bill Evans was interested in Zen meditation and often some fan or friend would ask him explanations about it; he invariably replied patiently that Zen is like jazz: you either "feel" the swing and the emotions that follow or you don't tune into it at all. And there’s nothing to do or possible explanations: there’s no way to articulate it in words, as (textual by Bill Evans) "words are the children of reason". There are therefore no words to fully explain what I or a peer of mine might have in their heart for AREA, so, about "Lupi sintetici e strumenti a gas" by Fariselli I can only say that: The review is beautiful, current, diagonal, meticulously curated in its sounds, very musical, and also contains a hilarious piece with Roberto Freak Antoni: buy it. Amen. :-) V.