NEMO, MILANO, CLEMENTE - FRATTURA COMPARSA DISSOLVENZA

This time Claudio Milano releases a live album from a performance in a very unusual place, a gasoline station in a town close to Florence, together with two other vocalists and authors. They agreed to add this album to Claudio's discography on PA even if it's a sort of "split".

The first performer is Alberto Nemo who is also the pianist. "Frattura" (Fracture) is present at the beginning and at the end of the album, but the total time of the two parts together is inferior to those of the other two performers.

So let's start with "Frattura Iniziale (Initial Fracture). It's started by the piano. There's a lot of reverb, but I think it's just the acoustic of the venue. It doesnt sound like an electronic effect. Nemo's voice is strong and has some similarities with Claudio's voice. I must confess that I've had a doubt about who this singer is. Luckily the whole live performance is also on Youtube. Alberto Nemo sits at the piano dressed (or betteer, undressed) like a Sikh, and his vocals which I was struggling to understand are just vocalizations. It's a sort of fusion between Dhropal singing and Catholic chants. It may sound like a prayer, but the only intelligible word that I catch is "Matame" ("Kill me" in Spanish). The real meaning performance is well explained in the album's booklet (in Italian, sorry). I don't know whether an English version is available. In any case, the "vibrations" created by the voice and the piano can vehiculate the message, partially at least. My own consideration: being able to put the eastern and western souls together is a proof of the common roots of the Indoeuropeans. Traditional musics share their vibes from Ireland to Bangladesh.

Niccolo' Clemente, aka Whale, has a composing style similar to Claudio. This time his piano accompanies real lyrics. Not very easy also for an Italian. I interpret it as the appearance and disappearance of life on Earth. The mortal remains of an extinct mankind. The lyrics are not much long, but enough to make phylosophical references. In particular the sentence "Il Tempo ingoiato dalla tempesta dell'atomo" gives me the idea of an Universe totally indifferent toward us. It literally means "Time swallowed by the atom's storm" It's the alpha constant that changes its value and destroys matter and energy. Time remains but is no more useable. There are remains, but not the mankind. Very good instrumental piano coda follows.

It's now the turn of Claudio. Now there's electronic behind, An unusual loop is the base on which Claudio repeats four words several times before staring o use his voice as i knows: "Morte, Dissolvenza, Vita, Trasmissione" (Death, Fade, Life, Transmission). The multi-instrumentis and electronic maestro Teo Ravelli aka Borda creates very intriguing soundscapes also distorting the voice of Claudio, adding echoes and effects to the vocals. Listening carefully, it's like Claudio is singing acapella over an invisible (inaudible is better) chords progression. This atonal music may can be reconducted to a proper song...but why doing so? As usual the lyrics written by Claudio are harsh, row, intense and sometimes disturbing. And it ends with a catholic standard prayer before getting back to the initial four words, but with different interval, tonality and background toward the sudden end. Trying to interpret the poetry, I think there's a connection to "The Wall". Traumas and a consequent attempt to hide himself (I want to dive into an ocean of shit) until the decision to escape "With the voice of an angel I scream my interior void. I want to get out!". I see it like the desire of tearing down the wall. Of course it's just as I interpret it, I can be completely wrong. The key is more likely in the word Dissolvenza (Fade). Disappear, melt into small pieces of awareness in order to rebirth.

Finally, Nemo is back with his mixture of east and west backed by his piano. It's a reprise of the first track and an excellent conclusion of the performance that closes the circle. At this point we have experienced the wordless chant of the soul, the disappearance of the mankind into the void of existence, the death and the desperate desire of rebirth, to the return of the wordless voice of the soul.

Challenging but rewarding. It's a sort of journey to the abyss and back, in some ways similar to what Dante does in the Comedy's Inferno, which was the subject of the previous performance by Claudio Milano with "I Sincopatici".