EMOZIONI

I was surprised for quite some time listening to my second Battisti album at how much of a letdown it was after the charming debut. Released in late 1970 "Emozioni" seemed to make no progress from the self-titled debut, in fact it felt regressive, and it felt like one of those rushed second albums quickly thrown together to take advantage of the first's momentum. Only then did I discover that this was not the next Battisti album proper, but rather a compilation of sorts gathering tracks produced over the period of 1966-1970. Further shocking to me was reading some of the praise the album gets, in fact it is the highest rated Battisti album at RYM of any title until "Il nostro caro angelo" and it almost beats that one too! So you may wish to disregard my review because I'm obviously missing the magic here.

I genuinely enjoyed Lucio's warm and melodic debut album from 1969, but "Emozione" sometimes left me bored with a mixed bag of decent tracks and a few underwhelming ones. It was not until the final tracks coming from the debut (Francesca and Io Vivro) that my ears perked up. Some of the others feel like unremarkable 60s pop-rock which offered much less than other artists were by that time, and much less interesting stuff than Lucio would be doing himself very soon. There is orchestrated pop with strummed acoustic and Lucio's frail voice. "Dolce di Giorno" is a bit bluesy and Dylanesque with some harmonica. The longest track "Il Tempo di Morire" is pure torture for me, a bit of a constricted, minimalist blues number about death. Next he turns a sweet, sentimental opening in "Mi Ritorni in Mente" into an energetic rocker spiked with horns before a warm ending---much like the material on the debut and quite lovely. That's another problem here: being a compilation the transitions between tracks sometimes feel disjointed. "Emozioni" is a quiet and contemplative piece of 60s softness, swelling and dying strings, soft guitar, romantic vocals, heavy emotions. It's really quite lovely and very traditional. After a few more typical 60s pop tracks there is another one called "Era" which again has a bit of a Dylan feel to the guitar playing and a simple folk vibe. After those two good tracks from the debut the album closes with "Anna", which if chronological, was the latest material and pretty mediocre. It has some trippy sounding background vocals, a very melancholic lead vocal and some strings or simulated stings creating a lush dramatic background.

This is not bad material overall, I personally don't believe Lucio ever made a truly bad album. But if one is rating his output on a curve then this is the material that is least interesting to me, from a prog perspective certainly, but also from a songwriting perspective. I would call this collection "for fans only," but again, others rate it much higher.

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