Sabryna Trash
Bando alle Ciance: Scopiamo!

Here's a little bombshell for you: Marrazzo, Rai journalist and former governor of the Lazio region, enjoys partying with transsexuals. Did you already know that?! What do you mean, nobody talked about it! Oh well, never mind. 

Leaving aside the prurient affairs of the unfortunate Marrazzo (who paradoxically sought protection and privacy in a friary, practically like an alcoholic going to work in a distillery), the questions that spontaneously arise for the average bar-goer, between a Campari and gin and a glass of good red wine, are manifold, but one stands above all: "Are all 'viados' Brazilian?". The answer is, of course, "No: there are also Florentine ones". The city of Dante and its metropolitan area have historically hosted a decent community of transvestites who populate the Cascine Park at night to release their sexual instincts since time immemorial, long before the invasion of mammal-like mulatto men that has been witnessed for a few years. Among this colorful fauna of particularly unique individuals, the presence of an artist—a beacon rising to give visibility to the category—was inevitable. Here’s Sabrina, aka Sabryna Trash, a transsexual from Prato with her workplace based in the industrial area of Calenzano, a must-visit on any self-respecting 'puttantour' in those lands.

Our Sabryna is a prominent figure in the Florence-Prato underground scene: between one trick and another (strictly with over-forty hairy southern truck drivers with a bit of a belly, as she insists on specifying), she performs concerts in alternative venues (or rather: "prestigiously squalid"), has a fierce fan club (the "Sabryna Tribe") and, most notably, boasts an astonishingly extensive two-decade-long discography. Yes, because the imperishable diva (as she calls herself) is not merely a web phenomenon of globalized modern times but has been riding the wave (so to speak) since as far back as 1989, when she began recording tracks that circulated underground in the form of cassette tapes. Disturbing legends surround her: for example, about an alleged video clip roughly filmed in the public restrooms at the Prato station, where the battered diva and her video operator supposedly risked being lynched while harassing unlucky defecators.

Musically speaking, Sabryna is the transgender counterpart of Leone di Lernia, with much more vulgarity and much less business. The first "publications" (handmade audio cassettes abandoned in highway restrooms) are nothing more than rough home recordings where our Sabryna whines pitifully over the original songs of well-known Italian and international pop stars of the time (Renato Zero, Gianna Nannini, George Michael, Boy George), later she shifted her focus to Madonna (her parody of "Confessions on a Dancefloor": "Confessions in a Public Toilet" is epic) and then, with the album under review, she ventured into the garrulous and muffled world of contemporary pop: Rihanna, Lady Gaga, and similar companions.

The creation of this album was arduous, but finally in April 2009, "Bando alle Ciance: Scopiamo!", yet another album by the imperishable diva, was released (it should be her twenty-first!), where the idolization of Miss Ciccone is set aside to probe the new stars of the global pop scene. The first encounter with the album makes you cry out at the colossal rubbish, but after listening to it, you don't feel total repulsion: there's something familiar about it, a something both annoying and known, a something insidiously lobotomizing, in short, there’s a feel of MTV: the commercial-musical container where a vulgar, exhibitionist, and sex-obsessed character like Sabryna would happily wallow like a pig in its and its kind’s filth. The difference is that she fully acknowledges being the quintessence of bad taste and lack of any talent or skill other than the use of the opposable thumb. And she's made all this her programmatic manifesto, starting with her stage name. 

Take any recent international pop music album, strip it of all the visual trappings that make it, at least, an exercise in applied aesthetics at commerce of a certain value (album artwork, video clips, live choreographies, etc.), remove the diabolical organization of the major label that funds its heavy rotation on radio and TV from behind the scenes, strip it of the magic of a cunning producer and the outward image given by the appealing starlet of the moment plucked from the stable of aspiring playmates and put in front of a microphone, and what remains is this irreverent little record: a collection of easy, sticky synthetic tracks like honey with disarmingly poor style. "Trash" in its purest form.

What better basis for the ambiguous diva from Calenzano? Here she is, then, launching into daring vocalizations defying any basic vocal technique and pity for the ears of others, almost embellished by extreme lyrics like few others: a belch in the face of the self-righteous, gratuitous vulgarity that at the end of the day is nothing more than her everyday reality. How can one not tip their hat (and vomit in it) to an androgynous singer (more andro than gina) who, on a catchy pop base, extols her love for urine and the consequent joy of pissing in a song like "Pisciatemi in Bocca"? The theme in these tracks is essentially always the same: the artist's disproportionate ornithological passion and her continuous adventures from one public toilet to another in the frantic search for an adequate filling for her rear end ("Usami e Gettami" and "Erezione a Catena").

Other themes parallel and complementary to the central one include criticism of the society that marginalized her in "Ke Dio Vi Maledica" ("According to society, I should be slaughtered. I'm a naysayer, a fart changing the air. Ever since I was born, I've been pitied by people but if you want to know the truth, I couldn’t care less. May God curse you and bless me in the doggy style position."), sex as a weapon to gain favors and social recognition in "Vanno con Tutti", and sexual scandals in clerical circles in "Bagascia Infernale", where Sabryna duets with Father Karras from "The Exorcist". Special mention goes to two tracks in particular: "Tegame" and "La Mia Vita di Merda".

"Tegame", which in Tuscany means "woman of easy virtue", is nothing more than a sublime and hilarious cover of Lady Gaga's "Poker Face" (I swear I became acquainted with this Lady Gaga through this track) with the now-usual lyrics stuffed with lofty figures that only a truck drivers’ escort can produce ("In my life what else have I done wrong who knows, every day I'm thinking only about screwing. I cross-dress or I'd starve, I'm Sabrina and I'm a 'tegame'... I don't go with the Chinese, I'm only looking for big tools. I’m not just looking for manual workers, but for a gang-bang that deflowers me"). "La Mia Vita di Merda" is the epilogue of the album: an introspective track outside the usual normas of the imperishable diva recounting the typical day of a 'viado' busy between house chores, caring for the synthetic hairstyle, caring for the work tool (the little pears, or rectal cleansings) and watching "Forum" on Rete 4 ("I love doing laundry, mixing detergents while taking antidepressants.. I prepare preserves without any pretensions, I even add a bit of marquis, I'm quite the perfect cook... A joint and a bit of grappa and I'm already ready to make a li'l b... maybe, why not, also with my neighbor"): an unmatched slice of real life.

Sweetening the end (sweet, yes... but also a little salty, as the good Malgioglio would say...) the entire discography of Sabryna Trash is freely and unlimitedly downloadable from her website. I shall gift an (inflatable) doll to the first person who recognizes all the songs whose bases have been borrowed. Happy listening. Or maybe not!

BBBANANEEEEE, BBBANANEEEEE A ONE AND A HALF EURO!!! BBBANANEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!