Aucan: Black Rainbow (La Tempesta, 2011)

Let's try something new. As you probably noticed, posts in this blog follow a strict cycle by decade: one album from the 00s, then one from the 90s, then one from the 80s... Until today, the 10s were totally ignored.
Including the current decade in the post cycle is quite a challenge for me for at least three reasons. The most trivial one is that as for now "the 10s" means just two years, so the choice is quite limited; this gets even worse since my policy for the blog is to post only music I really enjoy, and my tastes are quite difficult (and this was the second reason). Finally, there are already some excellent mp3-blogs following Italian latest releases (eg, The Breakfast Jumpers), and they're much richer, better-timed and more read than mine: what can I add? Well, I don't know. Probably nothing. But I'll experiment the same, and see if people like it or not. I'll monitor the downloads, and if they're ok... then I'll just keep on posting new albums alongside old ones.

Just another quick boring note before getting to today's album: have you noticed the fist icon in the left column of the blog? It links to Il Golpe e l'Uva Facebook profile. Subscribing will keep you informed of new posts, provide you some tasty links and videos that don't get published on the blog, and offer a good way to keep in touch, specially if you speak Italian - since the profile is in Italian.

And now, let's launch the new decade with a much hyped release...

I don't know of any Italian artist flirting with UK's dubstep tendencies. Or at least that was true before Aucan started incorporating halftimes in their music and make it sound more and more electronic.
"Black Rainbow" doesn't sound Italian at all. This is the most striking thing about it: it seems to come from London, Bristol or some place like that. It's some sort of eerie, metropolitan trip-hop hijacked into an electro-rock route. It features the same evil broken beats of Milanese or Caspa, deprived of the mud and made dry, massive and abstract. It's like Lightning Bolt goes to the club, with just a slight vocal hint at Portishead or Burial to content discerning palates.
Materpiece? Definitely no, but hey - it's damn good anyway.

Aucan are a trio from Brescia. Their first album came out in 2009 and was welcomed as the Italian response to Battles (it wasn't very good in my opinion, but neither Battles were, after all). 2010 saw them publishing an ep which marked their departure from math-rock, promptly confirmed this January by the release of their second album.

Tracklist:

1. Blurred (feat. Angela Kinczly)
2. Heartless
3. Red Minoga (Short Edit)
4. Sound Pressure Level
5. Storm
6. Embarque
7. Save Yourself
8. Underwater Music
9. In a Land
10. Away!
11. Black Rainbow

Download (320 kbps)


Similar music on the blog:
Dusty Kid: A Raver's Diary (Boxer Recordings, 2009)
Touane: Figura (Persona, 2008)