Vasco Rossi
Tracks 2

Or: scraping the bottom of the barrel.

Many questions can arise before an operation like this, even if the temptation might be to not ask any questions at all, curse, and change the subject. But then you read that it is the best-selling pre-Christmas album in our poor country, and some reflection is necessary for those of us who love music (writing about it, listening to it, making it...).

Keeping in mind that it's indeed the bottom of the barrel. A sort of micro-anthology like those published (God forgive me) by Neil Young, Springsteen, the Beatles, and many others. And the questions to be asked might be the following.

Does this operation make sense?

If one takes a historical perspective, trying to overlook the (for many) unpopularity and (for all...) the opportunism of the character, one cannot but conclude that the operation is equal to, or at least similar to, thousands of others in the history of so-called light music. Therefore, we cannot object more or worse just because it’s Vasco Rossi and not someone else (think about it: everyone has done these sorts of operations, even the best... even Waits..., of course, each with their product and with their quality... but we'll talk about that later...).

Are the bottoms of barrels all the same?

Let's take some examples: the Junonic Anthology of the Fab Four and the Bastards, etc., of Waits. The answer is: no, they are not all the same. They are not the same because the quality of the product is not the same, obviously. But if we don't insist on this point since tastes are tastes and every cockroach is beautiful to its mother, we can certainly say that the intentions and the productions are not the same.

In Waits' Bastards, just like in the Boss' Tracks, we find a real treasure of minor works, a tsunami of unreleased tracks, most of which find justification -as scraps- only in the artist's mind.

The story is different for the Beatles' Anthology, more akin to Vasco though far more grandiose: few unreleased tracks, many alternative takes, and some tricks.

Final question: ultimately, is this operation a good one?

Yes and no. The first three tracks are unreleased. The first is the radio hit cover, about which everything has been said and I will say nothing (it could, for better or worse, deserve a standalone review). The second is a good ballad from a lesser Vasco, the third is a fun little discard, but it rightly is, or was, just that.

Then comes a series of utterly useless live versions of minor and unattractive tracks, finally reaching the concluding covers.

"Il Tempo Di Morire" is good, full of energy, we save it. "Ragazzo Di Strada" works very well, as we noticed back in the May Day concert. And "Amico Fragile", certainly not unreleased in this version, is in my opinion truly beautiful. Vasco is a daredevil, an industry, a finished author (for many never even started), but in this interpretation, he poured out soul, life, emotion, sentiment. For me, it is a beautiful and absolutely not useless version.

His own "Sally" is also quite nice, raw and honest, voice and guitar.

A record that fits, in the end, but is crazy, and symptomatic at the same time, to see at the top of the charts.

So it is: if it wasn't him, it was the Pausina or Titty Iron, surely not others.

So, at least, it's the same, or slightly better.