Songs For Ulan
You Must Stay Out

"You Must Stay Out" is a travel record. Actually, no, it's for the journey. It incites travel. No matter what kind of journey it is, as long as you're alone. The 36 minutes of this lackadaisical, limping, and fluid orgasm begin with the confused progression, like a melancholic post-hangover awakening, of the title track. There's only a guitar to accompany the still rich and warm voice. Then, moments of silence. Some tinkling, which could be chains someone is trying to break, or ice in an empty glass waiting to be filled.

"The Counting Song" starts with its drunken, syncopated bass; an alcoholic, skewed morning awakening. "Little" is born almost as a just whispered lament, but soon the battering drums lead to a crescendo until the liberating explosion of an acid, distorted guitar screaming discomfort: I'm not worrying mama, I'll just make it by myself, before I grow old I'm little. But it doesn't last long: the sounds regain a clearer yet anxious breath, and the very fluid "No more, no less" begins; the sparse notes seem to drip from the ceiling, while De Cristofaro's voice becomes almost resigned. "Hell Was Next To Come" takes us to smokier, more nonchalant atmospheres, à la Tom Waits, but without losing that sense of hallucination that permeates the entire record, which saunters between bursts of anger, anxious pauses, and bittersweet abandonments. A bit like life, one might say.

For "Julie" the voice becomes warmer and deeper, resting on a soft guitar arpeggio: April brings the illusion of spring, and amidst windows swinging open and the scent of wine, Julie goes away, bidding a melancholic farewell. Who the hell is Julie? It doesn't matter; already a dark unease returns with "On My Hand", with an almost frightening pace, the last paranoid flicker before the "3 Submarines" invented by De Cristofaro's grandfather to tell him stories when he was a child and now he, in turn, sings them back with an affected voice carrying surreal sounds and tinklings. Sounds of 3 submarines going down, down, down towards Pietro's City.