Franco Battiato
Orizzonti Perduti

THE REVIEW

Let me start by saying that there are too many people commonly defined as artists, and unfortunately today they seem to multiply incessantly. At this point, I have a doubt: what else could someone who disdains Franco Battiato seek in art? This is a topic that could encompass a thousand other fields, but here I must remain within the realm of the art form I most appreciate and (per) pursue: Music. What did I say? Music? Oops… sorry for the archaism, today it is known as “the need for rapid consumption within a specific commercial realm of supply and demand.”
Fortunately, some stray from this realm, although there are increasingly fewer than in the past.
Those who seek a companion rather than a company in music know well that by the end of the 60s, the landscape had incredibly broadened, proportional to how, after about a decade, it narrowed (yes, progress); on the other hand, the same progress allows us to gaze at that landscape even if, like me unfortunately, one didn’t experience it live. Before returning to the album review, I remind those who want to refine their ears that in that decade, there is only room to get lost and try to make sense of it given the variety of sources, so it’s almost senseless to stray from it.

Exceptions, as always, exist, and in the Italian sphere, perhaps the only one bears the name Franco Battiato, the Artist (allow me the capital letter, at least to distinguish him among the many) who has shown how pop-rock can be not only catchy but also complex and, why not, cultured and committed.
The fifth album of Battiato’s pop-rock “series” was released in 1983, titled “Orizzonti perduti”. From a technical standpoint, the use of electronics is nothing short of perfect, and with increasingly advanced technologies, not surprisingly, he was the one to drag the avant-garde into the Boot.
But since we are still talking about pop-rock, considering the period, one must also consider the constant oppression by the Anglo-Saxon market and the emergence of the “CD” format (in Italy right from 1983).
It should also be remembered that here, as in the previous “L’arca di Noè”, Battiato seeks more meditative atmospheres, something rarely found in his first three pop-rock works; finally, for those who hadn’t noticed, Battiato’s lyrics are indeed complex and refined, but they deal with the most common things of our existence.
The album opens with “La stagione dell’amore”: here, the message is strong about not regretting missed opportunities, meaning “anything can happen,” the season of love doesn’t belong only to our past.
Next comes a sort of observation and description of the “Tramonto occidentale” (the family is in crisis-flags outside the cars) and how the artist manages to estrange himself from it (walking along the course-the pleasure of a cigarette).
“Zone depresse” aims for the same purpose, with a well-calibrated use of irony (give me some wine with hydrolithine).
The fourth track is perhaps the most subjective: in “Un’altra vita”, in fact, Battiato almost exhaustedly describes what bothers him and poses as the only remedy another life.
But it is “Mal d’Africa” that most engages: it seems almost possible to see him, the father combing his hair behind that window railing, and feel it, that smell of brilliantine! Here we also remember Lennon’s quote (stand by me).
The irony returns wise and poignant in “La musica è stanca” (the anecdote about Newton is fantastic!).
Less significant is “Gente in progresso”, which moreover seems to stray from the rest of the album and also reveals a sort of resignation.
The album definitively closes with “Campane tibetane” where the Artist perhaps overturns the feelings of the previous one and somehow links back to “La stagione dell’amore” by stressing that many beautiful things from the past can still delight us (I will return, I will return), whether they are Tibetan bells or jingle bells.

If you want me to rate this album from 1 to 5, avoiding comparisons with Battiato’s other works and being influenced by them, without any doubt it deserves a 5.
Then, if we want to make comparisons with the other so-called “artists,” the 5 becomes a nice bold 5.