Umberto Balsamo
Malgrado Tutto.. L'Angelo Azzurro

Umberto Balsamo - "Malgrado tutto... L'angelo azzurro" (1977)

That whale Mina dared with arrogance to reject "L'angelo azzurro," written by the strange Sicilian duo Malgioglio the lyricist and Balsamo the musician... The hit song played on radios and jukeboxes around the world, and the entire album has tender and melancholic atmospheres with a Battisti-like feel that today would require those slow smart drugs used by certain messed-up rappers. We often notice that 1977 expresses the fear of being left. This is due to the moment, which for the first time sees a decline (it would be the first real void in 20 years, but people live without knowing these things) and begins to see things negatively even when everything seems fine. One stays together yet at the same time notices limits or problems and sees things negatively. But how many obstacles and sufferings afterwards, despair and tears to become us....Battisti. First of May, with courage, I love you.... Tozzi. If you are the blue angel, I don't like that blue, the sadness..Balsamo. / And with the first notes of L'angelo azzurro comes the nostalgic memory of my first major crush on a foreigner; a little blonde American girl with blue eyes. I was captivated, indeed, obsessed, by this song by Umberto Balsamo titled "L'angelo azzurro". I wasn't the only one: back then, it was heard everywhere and even danced to in discos... indeed.

There was this young girl, daughter of Italian-American relatives who was on holiday with us, it might have been Easter, I don't know. I was infatuated, I found her so different from the Italian girls of the same age, stronger and more independent, perhaps even more aggressive but precisely for this reason seductive, as much as a budding adolescent can be. I believe her name was exactly - Angela-Angie to her friends. Cute, with big blue eyes and ethereal skin, very sharp compared to the Italian girls of the same age. Who knows why boys at the same age, throughout youth, are always more immature than girls, only catching up years and years later.

There must be some arcane law of nature that dictates this. Angie was the prototype of the washed-out blondes with dash that would cross my life later on. She also taught me the first swear words in English.. fuck off, fuck you, bitch, fag- I thought it was spelled as it sounded- feig. Sweet, right? If you are the blue angel, I don't like this blue. The beauty doesn't tell me, the words I wish. These first crushes, made of slang, songs, more or less explicit messages, adolescent complicities.... The little blonde was full of energy, and I could see her as a cheerleader. When we had to say goodbye, she was a bit sad too. There is no sweeter memory than the age that is the most beautiful: the childhood of summer afternoons and running on green fields. Filled with hope. Filled with simplicity. Filled with that nothing that made us feel free.