IL GRANDE ABARASSE

Much more experimental than the first solo album, it tooks 6 years to be released. During this period John De Leo has toured in Italy making not only concerts but also recitals, theatrical performances and various kinds of multimedial works. He has also realized several collaborations with various artists like the writer Stefano Benni and the Jazzist Roberto Gatto.

So there are several songs on which his impressive vocal extension and capabilities are of course the most remarkable thing, but the album is full of inventions, arrangements, overdubbing tied together by his usual sarcasm in the lyrics and quotes to famous italian pop songs.

The album is full of intelligent humour, unfortunately mostly in Italian. But also when there are no lyrics like in "Il Gatto Persiano" there's some humour. This track is complete made of vocals like Bobby McFerrin was used to do, but in this case there is also experimentation, not just "jazz".

"La Mazuka del Misantropo" is recorded like a live, and possibly it's really a live (you can't never know). The song is mainly made of acoustic guitar and vocals but recorded like it was on an old cassette tape recorder.

"Io Non Ha Senso" is grammatically incorrect. In English it could be translated as "I don't has sense". It's a slow jazz song with an orchestral base with strings, organ and sax which grows into a rock part then calms down several times. Very intriguing.

The strings of "Primo Moto Ventoso" remind to his early works with Quintorigo, but I think there's also a theremin in the background, unless it's John's voice, that's possible. A short chamber rock instrumental which suddenly leaves the scene to the rock of "50 Euro" whose main theme could stay in a 60s spy movie, but all the percussion are made of vocals. The lyrics are about paranoia.

"Apocalissi Mantra Blues" is one of the most user-friendly songs of the album so it needs to be counterbalanced by "The Other Side Of A Shadow" in which some vocalism are reminding in some ways of Demetro Stratos. This is not easy at all. Dark piano chords, vocals and speeches. At least this time in English.

The following song has a similar feelings but it's full of very good passages between rock and jazz with melodicparts in which I have the impression of hearing a bit of influence from the psychedelic period of the Beatles. The closer "Muto(Come Un Pesce Rosso)" litterally "Mute(as a goldfish)" starts as an acoustic rock-blues with the same instrumentation and similar production as "La Mazurka Del Misantropo". In the second part of the song John plays "percussion, bass and wahwah guitar" with his voice. As in the "Mazurka", at the end of the song there are some clap like it was (badly) recorded live, but some vocal things are likely overdubbed so it really sounds like a precise choice of makling it sound that way.

Even if the previous "Vago Svanendo" was probably a little better, also this album is excellent and full of good things, especially for those who like Quintorigo. He surely hasn't deluded his fans.

4 stars.