I would have preferred to leave the drafting of this review to someone who had followed Giovanni Lindo Ferretti's troubled and controversial artistic (and human) journey with more attention and devotion.

Even if partially and inadequately, I still want to say a word myself: I, who loved CCCP in the past, but then preferred to follow Ferretti's path from afar. I thus flew with indifferent snobbery over the CSI experience (even though I ended up knowing and appreciating "Linea Gotica" and "Tabula Rasa Elettrificata"); I ignored the release of Co.Dex, the solo album; I didn't bother to listen to the two works of PGR (even though I had the chance to see them live at the time of their second album); finally, I didn't take the trouble to read his books. I don’t know, it was a crescendo of disinterest, perhaps because I saw Ferretti's artistic trajectory as a mirror of the dramatic involution of the Italian left PC-PDS-DS-PD-? (...). A superficial vision, I admit, which is of little use in understanding an artistic journey.

In light of the recent Ratzinger-like conversion and certain statements regarding abortion and euthanasia, my interest in the character has finally further dwindled (transforming into disdain, I do not deny it).

Yet life is strange, its paths unpredictable, as if "Ultime Notizie di Cronaca" had called me: it was probably time for clarification and reconciliation with Ferretti; and I can conclude that "Ultime Notizie di Cronaca" is the missing link for me to understand the man Ferretti, even before the artist Ferretti.

In a context where it seems to have become the national sport to speak ill of Giovanni Lindo Ferretti (and I can understand why: the disappointment was incomprehensible for many, even before it was burning), I believe it is also time to give a frank and detached judgment on the artist (without automatically idolizing what he represented in the past). Not only that: "Ultime Notizie di Cronaca", despite marking (apparently) the end of the PGR saga, constitutes in truth a new beginning (it is the first post "conversion" work) and needs to be looked at with greater attention.

Listening to it, I can affirm that Ferretti is there. With a strong artistic identity that survives the latest existential upheavals, an artistic identity so strong that it places him, today more than ever, alongside great names of Italian music like De André, Gaetano, Guccini, De Gregori, and Battiato. And I am convinced that in ten years this will be clear to everyone.

In my opinion, "Ultime Notizie di Cronaca" lends itself well to this analysis, because it seems to represent the most sincere, heartfelt, personal, and autobiographical testimony (less ideological, so to speak) that the Emilian singer-songwriter has delivered to us to date.

Ferretti was the voice of a generation, of an era, of a part of the country; today he is the spokesman for himself, having survived the serious health problems that undermined his convictions and led to the definitive breakdown of his ideological shell, returning us an isolated man in his mountain home, lovingly caring for his sick mother.

Here it is that Ferretti’s perpetually restless soul emerges more vividly, always in search of a paradigm that gives meaning and strength to his existence, yesterday a political belief, today unconditional faith in God. Iconic are the verses "canto ballo rido, allegro mi dispero, montano italico cattolico romano a cuor contento", an affirmation of identity that may cause many to raise an eyebrow.

Yet the Ferretti unveiled in the soft notes of this "Ultime Notizie di Cronaca" is not a bigot, nor a fundamentalist, nor an intolerant extremist, but rather a man, a poor man, grappling with himself and a world that is difficult to define, finally codified and brought (but not without difficulty) to a flow where "everything passes and everything leaves a trace". The immanence of things, of the universal laws of the Divine if you will, beyond the transience of phenomena, beyond the bitterness and imbalance before greed, ignorance, violence, power, materialism and, from a more strictly personal point of view, the mistakes that are inevitably made throughout life ("having ascertained that what I need cannot be bought, nor can it be begged too long without becoming enchanted").

A lot of autobiography, therefore, a critical look at his past, but also a lot of current events, reviewed and reinterpreted with new categories of thought, which are not always antithetical to what he previously professed: one cannot but stop over themes today so dear to the author such as abortion and euthanasia, nor remain silent about war, nor fail to reflect on the mean mechanisms of capitalist thought ("already a consumer, man wants to be a clone, any commodity, he was as a slave, he will be as a master" - "War Chronicle"). This suggests that perhaps it is wrong to sharply divide between a before and after, and not to grasp the elements of continuity in the dialectical journey of the artist’s thought.

Moreover, it's known: Ferretti is certainly not a great thinker, yet he has the ability to read the Reality and return it to us in an intelligible guise through his peculiar broken syntax ("harmonic box", as he defines himself in the first verses of the album).

An intimate and personal dimension in which Ferretti (less declamatory than in the past) does not hide the exhaustion resulting from the daily existential struggle in this world, in this society ("I note some difficulty, difficulty in proceeding" - "2009 Chronicle"), nor the bitterness of having made mistakes, albeit in good faith ("not pleased with myself, I returned home" - "Return Chronicle"); a vision that at the same time knows how to give a unitary form to the complexity of Reality and consequent solace to the soul, seeking it in the sense of identity and rootedness in one's own places ("born among the dead, on the mountains, living on the mountains among the mountains, and there is no blade that can sever the languid chain" - "Mountain Chronicle") or in the care for loved ones, as occurs in the touching dedication to his mother ("in the time of your need, I am close to you, I am your support, by vital impulse, by natural law, by languid filial material chain" - "Filial Chronicle"): both dimensions elevated to natural law, if not to universal morality, as always happens in the sensitivity in need of dogma that has always characterized the Emilian singer-songwriter.

Between disenchantment and spiritualism, "present and eternal", Ferretti's rediscovery of the world and life sees its manifesto in the splendid opener "Cronaca Montana" ("certainly the circumstances are not favorable, and when are they ever?, one should...should do nothing, one must do what is, one must do the present") and undoubtedly reaches its peak in the most intense moment of the work: the moving concluding prayer "Cronaca Divina", where Ferretti's poetics reach sacred heights we thought possible only in the most mystical Battiato.

For many, Ferretti's wordplay may now appear to be empty stylistic exercises, a dull reiteration of the penetrating harangues of the past; yet it is impossible to remain indifferent to the incisiveness with which Reality is read and described (because in my opinion Ferretti thinks as he speaks, in dense brush strokes, in disconnected sentences), nor in the face of the images of a fragility that sheds Ideology, embraces Faith, but above all finds synthesis in a sort of pre-capitalistic communism, illuminated by the Divine, located in the mountains, among the sweetness, harmony, and comfort of Nature and loved ones. And this is where the album requires the greatest effort: in understanding what Ferretti is today, penetrating his person, separating oneself from the inevitable controversies that may concern the merit of the contents expressed.

There are then Giorgio Canali and Gianni Maroccolo: the first divided between guitar whims and sublime acoustic harmonies; the second relegating his instrument (the bass) to the background to engage in atmospheric electronics, always effective in highlighting the ungainly poetics of Ferretti, either with suitable ambient patterns, delicate rhythmic bases, or concessions to a more refined, cultured approach to auteur electronics. The meeting of these two giants of alternative Italian music gives birth to the perfect background, less tumultuous than in the past, conducive to Ferretti's restless lyricism: a sort of hybrid between gloomy singer-songwriter and pantheistic trip-hop, only occasionally torn apart by technology's contaminations and the frenzy of the global world, which emerges amidst hi-tech suggestions and the inevitable Middle Eastern airs.

Certainly, it's not all gold: at times it slips into excessively predictable solutions (both lyrically and musically). There isn't always an exceptional melodic search (rather a lot is worked on in terms of arrangement), so much so that the ghost of "already heard" inevitably hovers throughout the entire album (but how could it be otherwise when talking about artists with almost more than five decades under their belts?). And the suspicion that craftsmanship decidedly fills in where the gaps are more evident arises more than once.

Yet I do not feel like dismissing the latest work of PGR as the reheated soup of someone who no longer has anything to say. Maybe I haven't understood a damn thing, maybe I misunderstood everything, maybe it had been so (too) long since I approached Ferretti, maybe I was too eager to write this review without further deepening, yet at times I have the impression of being faced with one of the most sincere and significant works that the Italian scene has delivered to us in recent years.

And may the likes of Agnelli and Godano forgive me... will they manage to survive the unforgiving judgment of history in twenty years?

Tracklist and Samples

01   Cronaca montana (04:34)

02   Cronaca del 2009 (5769) (03:29)

03   Cronaca di guerra I (04:42)

04   Cronaca del ritorno (05:52)

05   Cronaca d'inverno (04:59)

06   Cronaca di guerra II (05:05)

07   Cronaca filiale (05:36)

08   Cronaca settimanale (06:43)

09   Cronaca divina (08:04)

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