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[Useless Preamble or Requiem for a Scrapheap]
At eighteen, in a sort of self-judgment, I buried my little past for a while. Back then, having dropped out of school, I bought an '86 Renault 4 with three-quarters of my first salary, registered in Pistoia, and driving back and forth between the countryside and the city, I worked in the kitchen of a restaurant in the center of Florence.
That period didn't last long, just as that old jalopy and that job didn’t last long. A year and a half or a little more.
But every day, alone in the long back-and-forth journeys hot in summer and cold in winter, with my rear prodded by the seat’s springs, I listened to a jumble of CDs on a used stereo system, mostly borrowed under the guise of seeking others’ advice.
Yes, indeed, this was my modest musical education.
Among a half-broken box set with all of De André's records, Portishead's Dummy, Spiderland, Bach, Abbey Road, Kid A, Rino Gaetano, Songs of Love and Hate, Bjork's Post, Dig Your Own Hole, the Berlin trilogy, Velvet Underground & Nico, Ravel, the Gorillaz, and Cannonball Adderley, there was also this album: Canzoni a manovella.
Who lent it to me back then and where it ended up now, I couldn't say.
But in my head, this album, today and perhaps even tomorrow, will always be tied to that old scarce car, rusty here and there.
…
Listening to it again today, I tried in vain to find a red thread:
Batrachomyomachia for drunk and indolent poets.
Vague lights and dilapidated stucco.
Scraps of sleepy, fantasized, imperfect stories. Uneven and mumbled half-mouthed.
And a brooding, a mumbling used to telling one story after another around midnight.
A container worn by time and found by chance: photographs, yellowed letters, fans, drachmas and rubles, crumpled phone books, crooked and worn tales.
Many mirrors that always reflect a different face (and sometimes nothing).
Untuned pianos and forgotten melodies.
Samovars, mats, gramophones, and poodles.
A tired, fringed carousel that lights up the night too much.
Long, long shadows and blind symbols.
Overflowing and gloomy songs, sadly adorned.
Limping ballads and gray rondos.
Shards and relics of times and worlds: among Jules Verne, Céline, and Salgari.
Noisy and ragged carnivals between Venice and Constantinople.
Joyful dreamlike frenzies. Colorful garennes.
Streets, nooks, and crooked paths, bustling and urinated.
The brackish, boozy, and carnivalesque frothing of half-tipsy, staggering novices.
A snuffed candle and lit curses.
Innocent little souls and small souls in onion sauce. Bowls of tripe and three ringing coins of cheese seated on a rough stool.
Greasy little packets and mute cunning.
Worn-out hats, greatcoats, surcoats, and threadbare overcoats piled up over there, on a shabby damask armchair.
And then slurred choruses, tattered orchestras, wrinkled maps.
Vespers of dying cities.
And many other things, ultimately forgotten by God and man.
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