Roberto Vecchioni
Calabuig, Stranamore ed altri incidenti

In 1978, Roberto Vecchioni released the album "Calabuig, Stranamore ed altri incidenti": it is undoubtedly one of the most cryptic and hermetic albums of the entire career of the Milanese yet Naples-born professor. I tried to give my interpretation, and in my opinion, the whole album is a metaphor for (or at least is connected to) the very tormented relationship he was experiencing at the time with his first wife, whom he would separate from shortly after, and the consequent strong moment of personal-sentimental crisis he was living in at that moment.

The album kicks off forcefully, even musically, with the compelling rock of "Stranamore - Pure questo è amore". In this track, "strange" loves are mentioned: a wife facing an alcoholic husband; a man leaving his woman very abruptly and even violently, to use an understatement (and I kissed you on the smile so as not to hurt you, and I shot you in the mouth instead of kissing you because it wouldn't take too long to leave you); a group of communists stopping a boy who refuses to buy their newspaper, while someone watching the scene declares himself a fascist, and his fear is not enough to make him say "enough" while they beat him (and I thought: "Now I'll tell them: I'm also a fascist" - but with every punch that landed straight on my head, my fear wasn't enough to make me say stop). In this parade of "strange loves," historical figures are also included, something very frequent in Vecchioni: Marcus Aurelius struggling with the war in Pannonia and perhaps also with his doubts and regrets regarding the same, especially after comparing his vision of man (and that of generals in general, excuse the pun) with the opposite view of a girl (And the dawn on the Danube seemed like phosphorus and honey to Marcus, and a blonde girl maybe wanted to tell him that man is great, man is alive, man is not war; but the generals answer him that man is wine: he fights well and dies better only when he's drunk); Alexander the Great disillusioned in front of his infinite and boundless thirst for conquest (And the greatest conquered nation after nation, and when he stood before the sea, he felt like a fool because there was nothing more to conquer beyond; and so much road to see a desperate sun, always the same and always like when he started); Garibaldi at the time of his departure from Quarto for the Two Sicilies, with probable reference to his casual "shifts," just to fight, in the ranks of liberals, monarchists, and Catholics (Beautiful the hero with blue eyes straight on the ship, he has more wounds than battles, he has the key. He has crosses and sickles in his hand and blah blah blah brothers), but the narrator, after hearing the speech of the Hero of Two Worlds, decides not to follow him, preferring the affection of his daughter (and I lifted you, daughter, to see him better, I don't leave and I stay watching you and I stay awake). Naturally, not all these "strange loves" are shareable, and the author himself seems to limit himself to listing them without giving a judgment on them, neither positive nor negative, perhaps only to make people reflect: "Maybe you don't know, but this too is love". It's also likely that Vecchioni was "inspired" for the title by Kubrick's 1964 film "Dr. Strangelove".

"Meeting you sitting on that train, all four of you twenty years younger, as if at the bottom of a hole leading into time": this is how the beautiful "Ninni" begins, the second track of the album. This track takes inspiration from the first story in Borges' "The Book of Sand," "The Other." In the book, Borges meets his younger self, the "two Borges" confront each other, and the memories of the "mature" Borges coincide with the projects of the "young" Borges: with this device, the writer establishes a very strong bond with his past. Similarly, in the song in question, Vecchioni imagines meeting his twenty-years-younger self sitting on a train, along with his parents and brother (also naturally twenty years younger), and begins to reflect. Evidently, in a moment of a strong personal-sentimental crisis, one always seeks refuge in the dearest affections, in this case represented by his parents and brother. Seeing them "rejuvenated" by twenty years along with him at the same time probably also leads him to remember the happy and carefree moments of his childhood, moments so different from those the author was experiencing at the time. Ninni was the nickname his mother affectionately called him as a child, and colloquially it means "little, child." There are precise references to both his mother (you drew smiles on the windows) and his father (he marked the horses to bet on): his father was in fact an avid horse race bettor, as Vecchioni himself had already "revealed" in the two previous songs about him, "The Man Who Plays Heaven with Dice" presented at Sanremo in 1973 (You played all of them without having kings in hand, full and horses or nothing, what else is there?) and "For an Old Child" from 1977, composed precisely on the occasion of his father's death, which occurred in that same year (And one Sunday, horses, cards, bets, and dreams came to tell me: "We leave him. Now he is big, now you know he no longer needs us"). Also dedicated to his father is the line "To tell the man who smokes without speaking: "smoke slowly, please" and then realizing that the future has already been and cannot change": in the present, as mentioned, he was already dead but in the train encounter he was still alive, and it refers to the fact that probably, the father himself was also a heavy smoker. Eh yes, this father evidently had quite a few vices, but despite everything, it is clear that Vecchioni adored him! But while he observes this "scene" with extreme pleasure, the author addresses his (then) current wife with an entirely different tenor, in a mix of bitterness and resentment: "How many times I've thought of giving up and leaving you there as if this life, which is nothing but isn't little, was a game. How many half-smiles at my returns, how many silly sprints on stopped trains, how many I call and they can't turn around anymore". But, in the end, turning to his mother, he tells her "And you don't know how much I'd like to tell you that your son hasn't changed, he was just waiting, and he is still as you called him: Ninni", with a regurgitation, albeit faint, of optimism.

In "A te," Vecchioni speaks with nostalgia and remorse of a (perhaps) extramarital relationship of a man with a woman victim, along with her mother, of abuse by her father: remorse because maybe this man didn't take the relationship further precisely out of respect for his wife, and instead, things with that same wife hadn't gone as he hoped, but in a completely opposite way. And so he thinks it would have been better to pursue that relationship so that "today" perhaps he would have been happier. But instead: "To you who counted my steps on the stairs, and the day always comes when there's no climbing anymore. To you not even a dream, not even an emotion, to you I left nothing but a bad song". An autobiographical song? Naturally, there's no way of knowing, but knowing the entire Vecchionian discography a little and considering what the author was going through in that period, I would definitely lean towards yes. In the diptych "Calabuig - Sette meno uno (Il cane, la volpe, la civetta, il fagiano, il cavallo, il falco)" it talks about the disappearance of a certain Sir Anthony Mcintosh during a fox hunt in 1821, and it says "nothing was ever known of him again" and also that "they will all return, only one will be missing": even in this case it is evident, in my view, the "metaphoric symmetry" of this story centered on a man who left to never return and never be found again with the sentimental-existential situation of the author at the time.

"Il capolavoro" in my opinion deals with the love and pleasure that every artist feels in seeing the fruit of their art materialize, be it a sculpture for a sculptor, a painting for a painter, a book for a writer, a movie for a director, and naturally, a song for a singer-songwriter. But also the difficulty of balancing private and artistic life could have been one of the causes of Roberto's marriage breakdown with his first wife. After all, Vecchioni himself was clear about this in his song from 1976, "Figlia," where, addressing his newborn daughter, he said "And sorry, sorry if we will see each other little and poorly": a "prophecy" that inevitably will come true. Even in the track "Il castello" I see an evident reference to his personal story: it talks about a woman waiting (in vain?) in a castle for the return of her man gone to war. In the end, he returns but "It's him, smiling at the door, it's him, the same as once. But he apologizes and won’t embrace her; he has tired eyes, he's always beautiful, but wears that cloak he won't remove and won't remove". This piece will be almost identically resumed, but with the new title "Fata" in Vecchioni's subsequent album "Bei tempi" in 1985: I have always thought this was done deliberately to emphasize the "new life" of the singer-songwriter with his new partner and definitively close a chapter of his "previous life," as also highlighted in the other track always present on the 1985 album, "La mia ragazza," dedicated precisely to his new partner. The album ends with perhaps the most cryptic song of the entire work, "L'estraneo (infiniti ritorni)," even if the title alone should be a revealing hint of the reference (also in this case, in my opinion) to the personal story of the singer-songwriter. Already the existential characterization of the protagonist of the piece, the stranger in question, makes us understand that we are facing a man with no certainties but at the same time, desperately needs them. And therefore, he is always looking for something or someone to give meaning to his life, for which he does not hesitate to embark on a journey and touch many places, both real and mythical such as Smyrna, Thebes, Toledo, Granada, Jerusalem, the lands of the Celtic people, sometimes resorting to very harsh and violent gestures, such as "And in a moment of Granada, I killed the same man twice, and his eyes didn't ask for forgiveness" or again "And I learned the thousand positions between women's and children's legs, their mouths like flowers" with a clear reference to pedophilia. But, I repeat, in my opinion, this song should be read symbolically-metaphorically, as almost all the others in this album.

Musically speaking, the album is dominated by ballads (Ninni, A te, Il capolavoro, Il castello) except for the rock (quite unusual for an author like Vecchioni) of the title track, the folk of the diptych "Calabuig-Sette meno uno", and the almost prog of "L'estraneo". The arrangements are by his faithful collaborator Mauro Paoluzzi; the musicians involved include Mauro Paoluzzi himself on drums, percussion, electric guitar, and acoustic guitar, Stefano Pulga on piano, Fender, and synthesizer, Billy Zanelli on bass, Lucio "Violino" Fabbri on violin (and it couldn't be otherwise), while Naimy Hackett contributes to the choirs.

In conclusion, for me, this is an excellent album that is part of Vecchioni's "magic period" which ranges from 1973's "Il re non si diverte" to 1984's "Il grande sogno" and contains within it four absolute masterpieces: the title track, Ninni, A te, and Il capolavoro (Nomen omen in this case). Naturally, what precedes is exclusively my personal interpretation of the meaning of the album's tracks, which is not based on any certain and objective data. There are certainly other possible interpretations, but music is also beautiful for this: once a song has been published and thus made accessible to everyone, anyone can give their interpretation, which does not necessarily coincide with that of the author. Or not?