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Rating: (1970s)
"Do you want to come see the mannequin?"
This story again, those two are always talking to me about the mannequin!!! I'm thirteen years old, the spring within, what do I care about some kind of giant doll? But the fact is that those two are the G. twins and they are at least as beautiful as Fujiko and Lady Oscar.
And anyway, no one knows the story of the mannequin, except maybe the families living on the lower floors of the old noble palace. It seems that Count T. lived with a simulacrum of his dead wife and that said simulacrum is still there after more than a hundred years.
"So, do you want to come or not? You do know it was the count's wife, right?"
"Great idea to be with a mannequin, you always get along with a mannequin."
"Look, it's a romantic story."
"Boh, maybe. But apparently, you can get a lot more than Pinocchio from Master Cherrytree's log." I act all cocky, obviously, and while I do it, I hate myself a little bit. Besides, that's not the point.
"We are friends with the caretaker's daughter and we're always wandering around the palace, we shouldn't touch anything, but how can we not? Once we opened one of the archive cabinets and we saw it. It's made of wood covered with something that looks like skin, but the face is painted plaster. If you help us, we can take it out and stand it up again, it's there folded upon itself like a discarded thing."
"Folded upon itself like a discarded thing." That's the point.
...
We are four: me, the G. twins, and the caretaker's daughter. We climb the stairs as carefully as cats, enter the room without turning on the light. We open the cabinet and the first thing is a sweetish smell, a cube of rotten sugar. Then from a mass of silk and wood, the rosy complexion of the face emerges.
Here are the gnawed hands, here are the disgusting hair. Here's the glassy fixity of the eyes.
Careful not to make the slightest sound, we pull it out and, after straightening it, we stand it up by leaning it against a table. Finally, we step back a few paces...
(I don't know why I keep using the masculine, it's a female mannequin)
...we step back a few paces and she, torn, bewildered, and absent, looks at us from the other world. She resembles Isabelle Adjani in the final scene of Adele H.
...
(1990s)
I feel something bad on me, a half-shiver, a kind of stupid nausea. And so I have to do something, like cleaning: enough chaos, enough dust in the eyes.
I'm chronically messy, but sometimes in moments of emptiness, I'm seized by an sudden urge to tidy up. It might be that when I look at a well-ordered table, I almost feel like I'm climbing out of the hole I've gotten myself into.
But to clean, you need music, I usually opt for safe stuff, hyper classics, albums of the heart, no mistakes allowed in the rituals.
This time, however, I decide to take a risk, yesterday X gave me a new cassette, "people like Massive Attack," they said, and I really like Massive Attack.
Then there's that title, "Dummy" and "Dummy" means mannequin.
Ding ding ding...
...
What is this stuff? Hyper-depressed dub? Melancholic white soul? I feel like I'm in a car, only there's no road, but instead a kind of drift between the walls of the house. It's a sensation I know very well and it takes me back to a place where as a boy I discovered a couple of secrets. And so yes, I'm in a car, but I'm also in an old attic with comics, cookies, and the "Profondo Rosso" cassette.
The music breaks, remains suspended, stretches into a deep echo that redraws the spaces and gives another breath to things. What is this stuff? Cinema for the ears? Sick lounge? And why is that voice so sad?
In response, the cabinet doors, of that cabinet, open like windows in the night, the voice, that voice, comes from there....
...
Meanwhile, the cleaning goes on and wide portions of the house embrace the mystery of a ruthless order. In a slow-motion that hugely separates moments, my gaze embraces every detail, I think it's the other side of things, the one that's advisable to just barely touch, but the impression is that the voice doesn't just touch it.
Once the work is done, there's only one thing left to do: sit and contemplate the new brilliance. Sure, that voice is still there, but how can you feel sad in front of a well-ordered table?
Trallallà...
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
01 Mysterons (05:06)
Inside you're pretending
Crimes have been swept aside
Somewhere where they can forget
Divine upper reaches
Still holding on
This ocean will not be grasped
All for nothing
Did you really want?
Did you really want?
Did you really want?
Did you really want?
Refuse to surrender
Strung out until ripped apart
Who dares, dares to condemn
All for nothing
Did you really want?
Did you really want?
Did you really want?
Did you really want?
02 Sour Times (04:14)
To pretend no one can find
The fallacies of morning rose
Forbidden fruit, hidden eyes
Courtesies that I despise in me
Take a ride, take a shot now
Cause nobody loves me, it's true
Not like you do
Covered by the blind belief
That fantasies of sinful screens
Bear the facts, assume the dye
End the vows no need to lie, enjoy
Take a ride, take a shot now
Cause nobody loves me, it's true
Not like you do
Who am I, what and why
Cause all I have left is my memories of yesterday
Ohh these sour times
Cause nobody loves me, it's true
Not like you do
After time, the bitter taste
Of innocence, descent or race
Scattered seeds, buried lives
Mysteries of our disguise revolve
Circumstance will decide
Cause nobody loves me, it's true
Not like you
Nobody loves me, it's true
Not like you do
03 Strangers (03:58)
Ohh...
Can anybody see the light
Where the morn meets the dew
And the tide rises
Did you realise no one can see inside your view?
Did you realise forwhy this sight belongs to you?
Ohh...
Just set aside your fears of life
With the sole desire
Done it warning
Done in now
This ain't real
On in this side
Done it warning
Done in now
This ain't real
On in this side
Done it warning
Done in now
This ain't real
Done it warning
Done in now
This ain't real
On in this side
Ohh...
Oh can anybody see the light
Where the morn meets the dew
And the tide rises
Did you realise no one can see inside your view?
Did you realise, forwhy this sight belongs to you?
04 It Could Be Sweet (04:20)
I don't want to hurt you
For no reason have I but fear
And I ain't guilty
Of the crimes you accuse me of
But I'm guilty of fear
I'm sorry to remind
You but I'm scared
Of what we're creating
This life ain't fair
You don't get something for nothing, turn now
Gotta try a little harder
It could be sweet
Like a long forgotten dream
And we don't need them
To cast the fate we have
Love don't always shine through
'cause I don't wanna lose
What we had last time
You're leaving
This life ain't fair
You don't get something for nothing, turn now
Gotta try a little harder
It could be sweet
But the thoughts we try to deny
Take a toll upon our lives
We struggle on in depths of pride
Tangled up in single minds
'cause I don't wanna lose
What we had last time
You're leaving
This life ain't fair
You don't get something for nothing, turn back
Gotta try a little harder
'cause I don't wanna lose
What we had last time your leaving
This life ain't fair
You don't get something for nothing, turn back
Gotta try a little harder
It could be sweet
05 Wandering Star (04:54)
Please could you stay awhile to share my grief,
For it's such a lovely day,
To have to always feel this way,
And the time that I will suffer less,
Is when I never have to wake.
Wandering stars,
For whom it is reserved,
The blackness of darkness, forever,
Wandering stars,
For whom it is reserved,
The blackness of darkness, forever.
Those who have seen the needles eye, now tread,
Like a husk, from which all that was now has fled,
And the masks, that the monsters wear,
To feed, upon their prey.
Wandering stars,
For whom it is reserved,
The blackness of darkness, forever,
Wandering stars,
For whom it is reserved,
The blackness of darkness, forever.
Doubled up inside,
Take awhile to shed my grief,
Always doubled up inside,
Taunted, cruel.
Wandering stars,
For whom it is reserved,
The blackness the darkness, forever,
Wandering stars,
For whom it is reserved,
The blackness, the darkness, forever.
07 Numb (03:58)
I'm ever so lost
I can't find my way
Been searching, but I have never seen
A turning, a turning from deceit
'Cause the child roses like
Try to reveal what I could feel
I can't understand myself anymore
'cause I'm still feeling lonely
Feeling so unholy
'Cause the child roses like
Try to reveal what I could feel
And this loneliness
It just won't leave me alone, oh no
I'm fooling somebody
A faithless path I roam
Deceiving to breath this secretly
A silence, this silence I can't bear
'Cause a child roses light
Tries to reveal what I could feel
And this loneliness
It just won't leave me alone, oh no
And this loneliness
It just won't leave me alone
A lady of war
A lady of war
08 Roads (05:05)
Ohh, can't anybody see
We've got a war to fight
Never found our way
Regardless of what they say
How can it feel, this wrong
From this moment
How can it feel, this wrong
Storm.. in the morning light
I feel
No more can I say
Frozen to myself
I got nobody on my side
And surely that ain't right
And surely that ain't right
Ohh, can't anybody see
We've got a war to fight
Never found our way
Regardless of what they say
How can it feel, this wrong
From this moment
How can it feel, this wrong
How can it feel, this wrong
From this moment
How can it feel, this wrong
Ohh, can't anybody see
We've got a war to fight
Never found our way
Regardless of what they say
How can it feel, this wrong
From this moment
How can it feel, this wrong
09 Pedestal (03:41)
How can I believe this miracle
Where the wind blows dry
Through the force of a man
Undenied by his eye
Oh you abandoned me
How I suffer
Ridicule breathes a sigh
You abandoned me
Lost forever
Hush, can you hear
Enter and rejoice this pedestal
where the rainbows hide
Your destiny
Mystery of all time
Oh no time make or reason
Ridicule breathes a sigh
no time, make or reason
Hush, hear him cry
No time, make or reason
No time, make or reason
No time, make or reason
10 Biscuit (05:04)
I'm lost, exposed
Stranger things will come your way
It's just I'm scared
Got hurt a long time ago
Can't make myself heard
No matter how hard I scream
Oh sensation
Sin, slave of sensation
Fully fed yet I still hunger
Torn inside
Haunted I tell myself yet I still wander
Down, inside
It's tearing me apart
Oh sensation
Sin, slave of sensation
I'll never fall in love again
It's all over now
At last, relief
A mother's son has left me sheer
The shores I seek
Are crimson tastes divine
Can't make myself heard
No matter how hard I scream
Oh sensation
Sin, slave of sensation
I'll never fall in love again
It's all over now
11 Glory Box (05:06)
I'm so tired
Of playing,
Playing with this bow and arrow
Gonna give my heart away
Leave it to the other girls to play
For I've been a temptress too long
Just. . .
Give me a reason to love you
Give me a reason to be...
A woman.
I just wanna be a woman.
From this time, unchained
We're all looking at a different picture
Through this new frame of mind
A thousand flowers could bloom
Move over, and give us some room,
Yeah
Give me a reason to love you
Give me a reason to be...
A woman.
I just wanna be a woman.
(Instrumental)
So don't you stop bein' a man
Just take a little look from our side when you can
Sow a little tenderness
No matter if you cry
Give me a reason to love you
Give me a reason to be here;
A woman.
It's all I wanna be is a woman
For this is the beginning of forever and ever
Its time to move over
I'm so tired, of playing
Playing with this bow and arrow
Gonna give my heart away
Leave it to the other girls to play
For I've been a temptress too long
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Other reviews
By luciano
Portishead is the only project that managed to impose a 9-year-old track of theirs in a car commercial.
The album is a benchmark.
By lovi
Add in epic and cinematic sounds, and heartrending and melancholic lyrics, and you feel transported into a three-dimensional dimension.
Beth shows all the J.LO or Spears what it means to have a bold voice... that naturally knows how to captivate.
By manliuzzo
Dummy consecrates itself as one of the best albums I have ever listened to.
Each track offers a different image, together creating a colorful and varied musical vision.
By The_dull_flame
This album engages, which is more difficult: you feel in the middle of the record, as if Beth were singing beside you.
‘Roads’ represents the pinnacle of beauty on the album, a dark ballad that gets under your skin like a needle.
