Goblin: The Goblin Collection, 1975-1989 (DRG, 1995)

Roman prog-rock quartet Goblin is mainly known as the band who scored Dario Argento's most celebrated horror films: "Profondo Rosso" and "Suspiria". Their haunting, repetition-based style, often driven by crystalline keyboards, roaring basslines and rampant jazz-fusion drumming is a staple of soundtrack music.

This is a very good collection which gives an idea of the many allures Goblin experimented for different films throughout their long career. Many of their soundtracks are nothing less than masterpieces, but I think it's better to start with a catalogue of their variety and use it to select the specific works that seem to be more interesting for one's personal taste.


Tracklist:

1. Profondo Rosso (Main Title)
2. Death Dies - M 32 (original film version)
3. Profondo Rosso - M 15
4. Profondo Rosso - M 31
5. Wampyr (finale)
6. Chi? - Part 1
7. Chi? - Part 2
8. Patrick - M 32 bis
9. Patrick - M 1
10. Patrick - M 34/34 Bis/35
    
11. Suspiria (Main Title)
12. La Via Della Droga - M 1 IV
    
13. La Via Della Droga - M 2
14. La Via Della Droga - M 6
15. La Via Della Droga - 31
16. L'Alba dei Morti Viventi
    
17. Buio Omega - M6
18. Buio Omega - M25
19. Buio Omega (Main Title)
    
20. St. Helen (Love Theme)
    
21. Contamination - M 3
    
22. Contamination - M 8
    
23. Tenebre (Main Title)
24. Bass Theme (from Notturno)
    
25. Phenomena - M 12
    
26. Phenomena - M 15 (Alternate version)
27. La Chiesa

Download:
Part 1 | Part 2

Fred Buscaglione: Criminalmente Fred (Sugar Music, 1992)

Ferdinando Buscaglione was one of the most known entertainers of the Italian Fifties. Both as an actor and as a singer, he played the character of a Thirties-style gangster: whisky, women and gunfights were his key clichés. From a musical perspective, he was one of the most important Italian jazz/swing players of his era. Relying on the proficient Asternovas septept (Buscaglione himself played the violin), he improved a distinctive night-club style with ironic lyrics and smoky, half-spoken vocals which would later influence many Italian artists, the most prominent being Paolo Conte.
"Criminalmente Fred" is a commemorative compilation which collects Buscaglione's most renown songs.


Tracklist:

1. Eri piccola cosi'
2. Che notte
3. Il dritto di Chicago
4. Porfirio Villarosa
5. Teresa non sparare
6. Sgancia e pedala
7. Whisky facile
8. Che bambola
9. Le rififi
10. Noi duri
11. Nel cielo dei bars
12. Che bella cosa sei
13. A qualcuno piace Fred
14. Ninna nanna del duro
15. Ciao Joe
16. Joe Castagnola
17. Fred's scat
18. Voglio scoprir l'America
19. Carina
20. Buonasera (signorina)
21. Love in Portofino
22. Guarda che luna
23. Tu che ne dici
24. Supermolleggiata
25. Non partir
26. Criminalmente bella
27. Una sigaretta
28. Mi sei rimasta negli occhi
29. Mi sei rimasta negli occhi (stumentale)

Download:
Part 1 | Part 2

Massimo Volume: Lungo i bordi (Mescal, 1995)

Now here we have one of the greatest masterpieces of Italian rock. The second album by Bolognese quartet Massimo Volume is extraordinary both from a purely historical/stylistic point of view and emotionally.

Massimo Volume's unique style revolves around vocalist/bass player Emidio Clementi's spoken word rants. Decadent, intimate and detached, grave, literate, extremely self-conscious. Clementi surgically outlines leaden, hopeless metropolitan life sceneries. One of the few "songwriters" of his generation who can actually bear his own writing tone.
The music more than supports Clementi's recitations, but it's probably the need to secondate them that makes their noise-rock basis shapeshift into dilated, nervous noise-jazz soundtracks which may be seen as the Italian way to the Louisville sound of Slint and June of 44.

"Lungo i bordi" is practically the first Italian post-rock album, and surely one of the most original of its decade. One of the most accomplished fusions of music and words to be ever carried out by Italian rock.


Tracklist:

1. Il primo dio
2. Il tempo scorre lungo i bordi
3. Inverno '85
4. Frammento 1
5. La notte dell'11 ottobre
6. Fuoco fatuo
7. Per farcela
8. Meglio di uno specchio
9. Pizza express
10. Da qui
11. Nessun ricordo
12. Ravenna

Download (192 kbps)

La compagnia dell'anello: Terra di Thule (Il cerchio, 1983)

Strating from the Seventies, the expression musica alternativa spread in the neofascist political areas to indicate every kind of music born and addressed into their circuit. Paduan band La compagnia dell'anello (The Fellowship of the Ring) are one of the most prominent and longest-lived in the movement.
Their first album was released only in 1982, but the band had already a long career of concerts and direct participation to the most extremist fringes of Movimento Sociale Italiano.

Despite their political stance, "Terra di Tule" isn't much dissimilar to other prog-folk albums of the Seventies, both from a musical and from a literary point of view. Most of the songs focus on medioeval-like musical and lyric themes and many of them strongly remind of Angelo Branduardi's work.
A strongly traditionalist, conservative and antimaterialist view can be guessed only looking closely to the lyrics of songs such as "Il contadino, il monaco, il guerriero", which reflect the fascination for a society based on pecking orders and honour bonds.

Many tracks show evident Irish influences, and some of them may remind Ireland-addicted band Modena City Ramblers even from a lyrical point of view. "Sulla strada" narrates an imaginary travel around Europe and its most inspiring places. "Pensando a un amico" recalls the post-Sessantotto years with a nostalgic aftertaste which surprisingly reminds of left-wing singer/songwriter Francesco Guccini.
The only song which is incontrovertibly soaked with neofascist ideals is the accordion-driven "Il domani appartiene a noi" (Tomorrow belongs to us), which was chosen as a hymn by the Azione Giovani movement.

Though not one of the best Italian folk-rock albums from a strictly musical point of view, "Terra di Thule" deserves some curiosity as a historical document.


Tracklist:

1. La terra di Thule
2. Pensando ad un amico
3. Nascita
4. Il costume del cervo bianco
5. Il domani appartiene a noi
6. Ninna nanna
7. Fiaba
8. Il contadino, il monaco, il guerriero
9. Sulla strada

Download (192/128 kbps)

Francesco Guccini: Fra la via Emilia e il West

This is the third live album by Francesco Guccini, one of the most famous Italian cantautori (singer/songwriters). Recorded during the 1984 summer tour, it serves as a good summary of the artist's career. The double-album features some of Guccini's most renown songs, which gained him the connotation of a very "political" songwriter: "Il vecchio e il bambino", "Eskimo", "La locomotiva" reflect a leftist view, strongly linked to the Sessantotto (68) era.
But "Fra la via Emilia e il West" also collects many pensive, melancholic songs, which actually represent the vast majority of Guccini's production. A very personal reworking of decadent poets Giovanni Pascoli and Guido Gozzano and the Joycean concept of epiphany consitute the core of Guccini's poetics. "Incontro", narrating a chance encounter with an old friend which becomes a nostalgic meditation on the passing of time, ends with these verses:

E pensavo dondolato dal vagone:
Cara amica, il tempo prende, il tempo da;
Noi corriamo sempre in una direzione
Ma qual sia e che senso abbia chi lo sa.
Restano i sogni senza tempo, le impressioni di un momento
Le luci nel buio di case intraviste da un treno.
Siamo qualcosa che non resta, frasi vuote nella testa
E il cuore di simboli pieno.

And I thought, swung by train:
My dear friend, time takes, time gives;
We always run in some direction
But who knows which it is or what its sense is.
It's the timeless dreams which remain, the impressions of a moment,
The lights in the dark of the houses, glimpsed from a train.
We're something which doesn't last, empty phrases in our head
And our heart, full of symbols.

"La canzone della bambina portoghese" describes the unspeakable extasis of a child standing before the ocean:

Gli amici vicino sembravan sommersi dalla voce del mare
O sogni o visioni qualcosa la prese e si mise a pensare
Sentì che era un punto al limite di un continente
Sentì che era un niente, l'Atlantico immenso di fronte.
E in questo sentiva qualcosa di grande
Che non riusciva a capire,
Che non poteva intuire,
Che avrebbe spiegato
Se avesse saputo, lei,
Che l'Oceano è infinito.
Ma il caldo l'avvolse e si sentì svanire, e si mise a dormire.
E fu solo nel sole, come di mani future.
Restaron soltanto il mare e un bikini amaranto.

The friends near her, they seemed to be submerged by the voice of the sea
Dreams, or visions, something took her and she began thinking
She felt she was point, on the edge of the continent
She felt she was a nothing, the immense Atlantic before her.
In this she felt something grand
Something she couldn't understand
Something she couldn't grasp,
She would have explained it,
If only she knew
That the ocean's infinite.
But the heat shrouded her and she felt herself disappearing, and she began sleeping.
There lasted only these: the sea, and a purple bikini.

From a strictly musical point of view, Guccini's songs are usually long, mainly acoustic, often refrainless folk-rock ballads. The model's rather american, with frequent excursions in disguised blues harmonies. Former Il Volo keyboardist Vince Tempera, Area's bassist Ares Tavolazzi and argentinian guitarist Juan Carlos "Flaco" Biondini provide a top-notch accompainment, spoiled only by some kitsch synthetizer timbre here and there.

If you are Italian, you can read a more detailed analysis of Guccini's poetics I wrote some months ago for the site ondarock.it.

Tracklist:
CD 1:

1. Canzone per un'amica
2. Autogrill
   
3. Il vecchio e il bambino
4. Il pensionato
5. L'isola non trovata
6. Asia
   
7. Canzone della bambina portoghese
8. Canzone delle osterie di fuori porta
   
9. Il frate

CD 2:

1. Piccola città
2. Venezia
   
3. Bologna
4. Eskimo
5. Incontro
6. Vedi cara
7. Un altro giorno è andato
8. Canzone quasi d'amore
9. La locomotiva

Download (192 kbps)
CD 1 | CD 2

Dagada Saf: No Inzro (Rockgarage Records, 1984)

Degada Saf were an electropop quartet from Treviso, Venetia. Their first and only LP features eight tracks with nonsense Esperanto lyrics, emphatic vocals and obsessive electronic rhythms. Harsh guitar swirls, transfigurated Talking Heads architectures and synth-handclaps complete the formula. The compositions are quite simple, minimal-sounding, and the moods oscillate between cyberpunk nightmares à la Cabaret Voltaire and more jaunty, dancey grooves.
I have to thank the blog 7'' from the underground for having posted this record first.


Tracklist:

1. La rumba de Shang Hai
2. Riz du flues
3. Tri-banal
4. Loda loda
5. Zom Africa
6. Polisumis
7. Om
8. No inzro

Download (192 kbps)

Ephel Duath: Pain Necessary to Know (Earache, 2005)

For the first English language album of the blog, I chose one of the few internationally praised metal albums of the Italian scene.
Here's a review I wrote two years ago for the site rateyourmusic.com. It was chosen to be put on the homepage and probably contributed substantially to the popularity of the album in the RYM community.

Such a weird album! When I got it, I thought it should have been a more polished version of the hyper-technical death-jazz of their previous album, with amazing trumpet works, clean guitar-vocals passages and so on. Then I start listening to it and I'm completely bewildered: what's that swamped guitar sound? Where have all the jazz influences gone? Is this the same group? Do these songs actually have a sense, or are they just plain noise?
It took me quite a long time to answer these questions, and even now I'm not totally sure I actually "got into" the album. The music is definitely one of the heaviest things I ever listened to. The guitar sound, which is obtained combining three amplifiers or something like that, is muddier than anything the Melvins could even imagine. Clean vocals and direct jazz influences have completely disappeared. The music is mostly instrumental, with screamed vocals appearing here and there even more disturbing than in "The Painter's Palette". Jazz has migrated from the surface to the true essence of their music: the tempo is never the same throughout the song, which have something of math rock structures-meet-jazz harmonies. I can't even say if this album is still metal or it's something completely different, but it's definitely something which deserves to be listened to. Highly recommended!

Tracklist:

1. New Disorder
2. Vector, Third Movement
3. Pleonasm
4. Few Stars, No Refrain and a Cigarette
5. Crystalline Whirl
6. I Killed Rebecca
7. Vector, First Movement
8. Vector, Second Movement
9. Imploding

Download (~210 kbps)

A Short Apnea: Illu Ogod Ellat Rhagedia (Ustrainhustri) (Wallace, 2000)

Though Italo-Basque guitaris Xabier Iriondo founded A Short Apnea while still in Afterhours, no two bands could sound less akin one to the other. The the long, improvised tracks of "Illu Ogod Ellat Rhagedia" sound closer to the so-called "now wave" scene (a post-rock subcurrent based in Chicago) than to anything else.
Rickety guitar shards, processed drum screes, freeform keyboard canvases and occasional, unintelligible psalms create a deconstructed, edgy soundscape which reminds much of Gastr Del Sol, You Fantastic!, Gorge Trio (the band would eventually team up with the latter for the album "...Just Arrived"). The mood's more claustrophobic, cybernetic, but the result fears no comparison with its American inspirers or A Short Apnea's most direct Italian forerunners, Starfuckers.


Tracklist:

1. I
2. II
3. III

Download (192 kbps)

Stormy Six: Macchina maccheronica (L'orchestra, 1980)

One of the founding members of the Rock In Opposition movement (Henry Cow/Art Bears, Samla Mammas Manna, Etron Fou Leloublan, Stormy Six, Univers Zero, Art Zoyd, Aksak Maboul), Stormy Six had the great pop-musicologist Franco Fabbri as a guitarist. They began their career opening for the Rolling Stones concert in Milan, in 1967. After a couple of singles based on Italian cover versions of English hits, they released their first album "Le idee di oggi per la musica di domani" (Today's ideas for the music of tomorrow). Their style evolved from a Beatles/Moody Blues psych-pop into a complex and politically engaged progressive folk, strongly influenced by the neo-Partisanism of the Cantacronache movement. The peak was reached in 1975 with their fourth album "Un biglietto del tram" (A tram ticket); the nine-minute long "Stalingrado/La fabbrica" is still a classic of left-wing demonstrations.
"Cliché" collected a couple of theatre soundtracks, but the real turning point towards a more explicitly experimental attitude was "L'apprendista" (The apprentice), in 1977. With its complex Gentle Giant nestings, its chamber/folk leanings and more easy-going lyrics, it was more than just a prelude to the unique R.I.O. sound of "Macchina Maccheronica" (Macaronic machine).

Being released in 1980 - definitely late for a progressive album - "Macchina maccheronica" was overlooked in Italy, but it was praised by the German critics. Featuring ex-Henry Cow cellist Georgie Born, the LP still focuses on the elaborate inlays of the previous one, but the attitude is much more ludic: fanfare-like passages are spread everywhere, multi-style renditions of the Milanese 30s song "O mia bèla madunina" are used as track separators. The music's anyhow the most experimental ever released by the band until then: unusual scales and harmonies, complex rhythm patterns and instrumental weaves are the key elements of the longer tracks, which particularly shine for the lively wind lines and the Fripp/Frith guitar soloing of Franco Fabbri.

The band would continue their career until the mid-eighties and face some live reunions in the Nineties, but I'll probably write about these events in a second time.


Tracklist:

1. Macchina maccheronica
2. Le lucciole
3. Madonina
4. Megafono
5. Madonina
6. Banca
7. Pianeta
8. Rumbo sugli alberi
9. Enzo
10. Verbale
11. Madonina
12. Somario
13. Madonina
14. Macchina Maccheronica

Download (192 kbps)

Bonansone Dedalus Group: Nomos Apache Alpha (BTF, 2004)

Initially a jazz-rock band featuring the now well-known jazz bass player Furio Di Castri, Piedmontese band Dedalus published two albums, in 1973 and 1974. It's probably the deconstructions, found sounds and tape experimentations of the last one, "Materiale per tre esecutori e nastro magnetico", which convinced Steve Stapleton to include them into his legendary Nurse With Wound List.

After a thirty-year hiatus, actually broken one time in 1997 with the publication of "Pia visione", keyboardist/cellist/accordionist Fiorenzo Michele Bonansone decided to start a new project and revive the spirit of Dedalus. Assisted by two classical musicians and a drummer with a thing for funky and african rhythms, he published "Nomos Apache Alpha" as Bonansone Dedalus Group.
Hailed with "Premio Darwin" as the best Italian prog-rock release of the year, the album's actually more rooted into modern classical music than rock. Reflecting a strong post-minimal vibe, the music's sometimes close to the one of Michael Nyman, specially for the frequent use of tonal material and pseudo-classical patterns which are used as melo/rhythmic modules of the compositions.
The mood's rarefied, poised but capable of tension peaks and climaxes, free episodes and more high-spirited or academic sections. Some tracks feature vocals, which seem to be sung in dialect. Piano (both acoustic and electric), flute, cello and trombone are the key elements of the album, which constitutes a stunning example of how a progressive approach can be achieved even without any rock element.


Tracklist:

1. Nomos Apache Alpha
2. Dal sonno
3. Luvmin
4. Trenosol
5. Via di miel
6. Rockocò
7. Turu turu
   
8. Canzon capriccio
9. Clangclumps
   (Clangs1/Clang-cuore/Clangs3)

Download (224 kbps)

Celeste: Principe di un giorno (Grog, 1976)

Published in 1976, but actually composed and recorded between 1974 and 1975, "Principe di un giorno" is the first album by Sanremese band Celeste and one of the finest of the spaghetti-prog era.
The mood is prevailingly soft, fairytalesque and slightly melancholic. It certainly reminds of La Locanda delle Fate, early Pierrot Lunaire and the gentler episodes of the first King Crimson LPs.
Acoustic guitars, mellotron and so much as two flutes dominate the sound, which is occasionally enriched by saxophone, violin and very delicate cymbal touches. The synthentetizer plays apparently a secondary role (just a few melodic themes in the background, here and there) but in fact is very important to create a dreamlike, sometimes grandiose atmosphere.
Not to mention the more experimental episodes, where the synthetizer is loaded by effects, the winds shift to a non-jazzy chamberlike style and the overall sound comes quite close to Picchio dal Pozzo.

The arrangements are elegant and balanced, the melodies weightless and memorable. The album has the power to charme and entangle the listener: it won't easily be left aside.


Tracklist:

1. Principe di un giorno
2. Favole antiche
3. Eftus
4. Giochi nella notte
5. La grande isola
6. La danza del fato
7. L'imbroglio

Download (192 kbps)

Arpaderba: L'aleph (In-Contro, 1981)

An almost unknown band lead by Raccomandata Ricevuta Ritorno and Samadhi's guitarist Gianni Civitenga, Arpaderba issued only one album, "L'aleph", which is now very rare.
The style is a very personal blend of progressive, folk dance and minimalism. Entirely instrumental, the album reminds as much of Terry Riley as of French prog-folk bands such as Malicorne or Minimum Vital. Though the celtic influences are very strong, most of the tracks appear to be rooted in a more mediterranean repertoire: the result is surprisingly close to the one achieved by Paolo Fresu with his Sardinian folk-jazz band, Tanit.
Repetition, odd meters and gleeful synthetizer soarings are the core elements of Arpaderba's unique formula, which is often enriched by violin, e-piano, marimba, accordion and well-rounded, groovy basslines.
The album's deeply charming and captivating, its quiet but overwhelming pace never take a moment for rest.


Tracklist:

1. Danza
2. L'aleph
3. Ritmi di luna
4. Labirinto
5. Ballo dei satiri
6. Cantata di primavera
7. Tarentilla

Download (224 kbps)

Franco Battiato: Giubbe Rosse (EMI, 1989)

Franco Battiato's one of the most prominent Italian artists. His critically acclaimed production began in the seventies with some experimental albums which embodied a very personal progressive/kosmische musik formula with slight ethnic allures. The album "L'Egitto prima delle Sabbie" won the international Stockhausen prize as best piano composition.
Right after that, at the end of the decade, he began shifting towards a more pop attitude. "La voce del padrone" (1981) was the first Italian album to sell a million copies and definitively marked the style transition. Battiato's music was still very innovative: now blending synth-pop, mediterranean suggestions and a nonsense/citationist approach to the lyrics, his new recipe sounded groundbreaking and had a distinct influence on many Italian artists of the Eighties.

"Giubbe Rosse" is his first live record. A double album collecting songs from three 1988 performances in theatres around Europe (Paris, Milan, Madrid). The tracks span over all of his career, thus including both mainly instrumentally-focused synthetizer compositions and his most famous pop songs. Some of the latter were originally written by Battiato for other Italian singers: "Lettera al governatore della Libia", brought to success by Giuni Russo, was never released by Battiato before this album.


Tracklist:

1. Giubbe Rosse
   
2. Alexander Platz
3. Lettera al governatore della Libia
4. Mesopotamia
5. L'era del cinghiale bianco
6. Un'altra vita
7. Voglio vederti danzare
8. Oceano di silenzio
9. Sequenze e frequenze
10. Aria di Rivoluzione
11. No U turn
12. Summer on a solitary Beach
13. Cuccurucucu
14. Centro di gravità permanente
15. Gli Uccelli
16. E ti vengo a Cercare

Download (160 kbps)

Gomma Workshop: Almanacco moderno sul linguaggio dei gatti (Madcap collective, 2004)

Gomma Workshop is an imaginary sextet, reworking the music of many imaginary artists using an imaginary 150-track recorder from 1977, called "E. Sapphire". In fact, Gomma Workshop's basically just multi-instrumentist Vittorio Demarin and a lot of toy instruments, found sounds and pseudo-folk leftovers.
"Almanacco moderno sul linguaggio dei gatti" ("Modern almanac about the language of cats") is a peculiar work mixing tape experimentation, musique concrète and indietronic leanings, dusty folkloric mullings, Italian lounge and soundtrack music (specially Nino Rota). The result could be compared to anything from Aksak Maboul to Four Tet, from Jim O' Rourke to Pascal Comelade.
The album actually seems to come out directly from the Nurse With Wound List. Despite its uncohesive attitude, though, it manifests a very strong compositional lucidity and never fails to be evocative and entertaining, sprightly, imaginative and impalpable.


Tracklist:

1. Gertrud
2. My Heart the Spoon
3. Bruitages Cubik
4. Ernesto Sapphire Lost Tapes
5. Lauraborg
6. 500 metri di torte
7. Nuovi algoritmi sovietici
8. Ink Q.B.
9. Mangiabimbi
10. Print
11. Peter Sellers in the Swamp
12. Soap Soup

Download (224 kbps)

Equipe 84: Stereoequipe (Ricordi, 1968)

Often dubbed as "The Italian Sgt. Pepper's", "Stereoequipe" is the third and best known album of Modenese beat quartet Equipe 84. The twelve tracks collect all the 45" released by the band in 1967/68 and include four Italian renditions of English hits and two of the most successful Italian singles of the Sixties, "Nel cuore, nell'anima" and "29 Settembre". All of them, together with the remaining tracks, are arranged in a typical Beatles-like fashion: "Nel cuore, nell'anima" wonderfully recreates the string quartet miracle of "Eleanor Rigby", while "29 Settembre" is notable for the pioneering use of radio news excerpts to give the song a topical feeling. Many other refined gimmicks are employed throuought the album: horns, winds, tablas, sitar, wind effects... The result is still impressive today and particularly shines for its bright melodies and adventurous sound (with great piano and bass guitar performances). It's certainly a masterpiece of Italian beat.

Four songs are signed by the Battisti/Mogol duo and were released by Equipe 84 before Battisti's solo success. Some others ("È dall'amore che nasce l'uomo", "Per un attimo di tempo") were written by Francesco Guccini (which would later become one of the best known Italian singer/songwriters) but credited to Equipe's singer Maurizio Vandelli, just because Guccini was not a member of SIAE, Italian musical copyright society.
"Stereoequipe" ows its name to the fact that it was the first Italian album to be released only in its stereophonic version.


Tracklist:

1. Nel cuore, nell'anima
2. Ladro
3. È dall'amore che nasce l'uomo
4. Nel ristorante di Alice
5. 29 Settembre
6. Un anno (No Face, No Name, No Number - Traffic)
7. Un angelo blu (I Can't Let Maggie Go - Honeybus)
8. Tutto è solo colore (Every Little Bit Hurts - The Small Faces)
9. Hey ragazzo
10. Per un attimo di tempo
11. Intermission riff
12. Nella terra dei sogni (Land of Make Believe - Easybeats)

Download (224 kbps)

Spirale: omonimo (King, 1974)

Spirale were a jazz-rock band, which would be known later as "Folk Magic Band" and quite renown for their participation to international jazz festivals. Their first and only LP with the original bandname is now very rare and could be compared in style to ethno-prog band such as Maad (Italy) or Embryo (Germany).
E-piano, bass and drums provide a light, groovy carpet of obstinatos for the lyric excursions of trumpet, saxophone and flute. The mood is breezy and absorbing, the rhythms are often veined of South-American or Indian suggestions. The shadow of Dave Brubeck's "Time Out" towers specially over the longest track, "Paparoncino" and its compound meters. Its southern-Italian folkloric accents and the funambolic violin solo contribute in making it a very accomplished piece.


Tracklist:

1. Rising
2. Cabral, anno 1
   
3. Una ballata per Yanes
4. Peperoncino (Cose vecchie, cose nuove)
   

Download (256 kbps)