MILLE IDEE DEI GIGANTI

After having conquered the Italian beat music scene with a string of pop hits, I GIGANTI milked as much out of their self-titled debut as they could and took three years to release its second album MILLE IDEE DEI GIGANTI (A Thousand Ideas of I Giganti) which appeared in 1969. Although the world had moved on the beat music had morphed into psychedelic rock and early prog and hard rock, I GIGANTI pretty much stuck to the music that had launched them into the world of catchy pop music however on this sophomore album the melodies were primary delivered by piano rolls and the vocals featured less of the harmonic deliveries in the vein of The Beach Boys or The Beatles and only one vocalist acted alone however some tracks such as "Il Lavoro" were clearly recorded a lot earlier and sounded like it was a leftover track from the debut.

Unlike the debut there were no singles released from MILLE IDEE DEI GIGANTI however on the CD reissue all the non-album singles that were released during the 1967-68 timeline can be found. By this time I GIGANTI had released 15 singles and even played with The Beatles during one of their Italian gigs so the band was riding high in their home country but the musical tides had changed and although the approach is somewhat different on MILLE IDEE DEI GIGANTI, the band was clearly still rooted in the pre-psychedelic rock of rock'n'roll, gospel and British beat music of the early Beatles, Who and Kinks.

What's really surprising about I GIGANTI is how they totally reinvented themselves for the band's third album, the ambitious "Terra In Bocca" which tacked a concept album about the mafia which would emerge just two years after this second album which seemed to be stuck in the past. The band's debut was an exhilarating display of four excellent singers weaving mesmerizing vocal harmonies accompanied by strong melodic hooks that made the band irresistible however this second album seems to have gone astray with several tracks mined from the early years and an attempt to create moodier atmospheres behind the beat music. As a consequence this second album just feels less focused with weaker tracks and in many ways feels totally irrelevant for the year 1969 when rock music had evolved a millionfold since 1966.

This is by no way a horrible album as it captures the essence of beat music but at this point I GIGANTI were spinning their wheels. Perhaps the success and constant touring prevented the band from moving on when the rest of the world was. Luckily the band got the memo and once they did they would return in two years time with one of Italy's most ambitious concept albums of progressive rock that predated the biggest acts of the Italian prog scene. It's fair to say that probably nobody saw that one coming. As far as progheads wanting to explore these previous two albums, it's the first one that displays competent beat music while this one is a bit forgettable as the energetic drive has diminished as has the songwriting. The best song on this one is the closing surf rocker "La Balleta Delle Streghe" although it sounds like a relic from the early 1960s.