MALEDETTI

Don't be misguided by their genre: "jazz-rock fusion" might mislead you and make you think these guys sound like Pat Metheny and the like. Well, no. Not in a thousand years. There is no "touch of class" so typical for majority of jazz-related music: this is the rawest and most brutal force within the free-jazz experiments, occasionally touching rock and other genres, with insane growls by vocalist Demetrio Stratos. The rest of AREA's albums are pretty much in the same vein (that doesn't mean that they are unimaginative), but this one is my favourite.

This is a concept album. I guess. There is some guideline story about "what would happen if...", and (as illustrated through the songs on this album) every song is a example of the world and society dominated by the women, children, elderly and so on. Therefore, we can't judge very hard occasional non-musical tracks here, because they are all parts of the statement, and no matter where will the music turn in the next few seconds, the idea is evolving all the time. A very unique concept. I'm almost sure that for occasional lyrics they picked pieces of paper from the hat, and than formed the random sentences.

Anyway, the music is equally chaotic as the lyrical concept itself. But it's great nonetheless. We can hear traditional Greek lullaby, free-jazz, anarcho-jazz, conquered-jazz and all other forms of jazz. There are elements of funk music thrown in for a good measure, Balkan music, rock and pure avantgarde. I mustn't forgot the classical music too: "Il massacro di Branderburgo numero Tre in Sol Maggiore" (what a title!!) - is actually played by string quartet with the idea : "What would happen with the today's music if only one note from Bach's piece had been changed?" That is a really nice variation. It floats in apocalyptic "Giro, giro, tondo" with lyrics about a child who wish to control human, through nice allegory of child's game (at least that's my impression).

The music itself is mostly driven by bass and furious drums, with loads of piano and keyboard works, spiced up with incredible Demetrio's vocals and his daring experimentations: from yodeling, squeaking, howling, growling, snoring, sometimes all of that in the same time.

This is a brilliant piece. But be warned: it's not for everyone, it requires some time to digest.

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