With the Baustelle we had left just two years ago, with what was perceived as a transition record, “Elvis”, one of the albums with the most guitars in the history of the Tuscan formation, son not only of yet another stylistic turning point but also of the total renewal intervened in the composition of the backing banddeemed necessary to change register after the electropop's drunkenness of the two volumes of “Love and violence” and symphonic baroques that marked “the mystics of the West” and “Phantom”. The songs that populate “El Galactico”, which confirm a convinced momentum, have come out on the adrenaline wave of the tour to support “Elvis” rock orientedon this occasion directed towards late matrix sounds Sixtiesbetween rickenbacker and buildings Jangle-Popdreaming of California, in particular the beaches around Venice Beach.
Elements assimilated by Byrds and Beach Boys are perceptible by listening to traces such as “Giulia as you are” (theincipit Del Cantato recalls “Anthropophagus”) and even more “Pesaro” which, located at the opening, immediately gives the tone to the album with a snapshot that captures Bianconi on the seafront of the Marche city, as soon as they were aware of the disappearance of the father, who suddenly arrived a few months ago. The “sunny” system of the disc therefore does not intend to conceal content in many cases anything but cheerful: emblematic in this sense is “philosophy of Moana”, in which a text is superimposed on a colorful musical texture that narrates the last days of the famous pornstar in a lucid way, now forced on a hospital bed, approaching cynical realism and subtle irony.
Even more moving the story behind “a story” (the truth Instant Classic of the album), which renews the series of narratives focused on infamous adolescence, series already inaugurated at the beginning by “The song of the reformed”. Francesco Bianconi outlines coldly (from the girl's point of view: not easy …) an episode of violence that is consumed on the rear seat of a car: it does not flow into femicide, but in a video recovery that will end up on the net, a story of shame, resignation, a story that hurts, like many who crowd the evening news every day. The typical arguments of Baustellian poetics are back: death, violence, decadence, as well as religion, mysticism, escapism, caught as usual from unconventional points of view, still image extracted from the script of an imaginary film, a terribly raw film-truth.
The sound “El Galactico” is dense and stratified, well produced and structured work, with an excellent organization of space and the perfect guitar imprint in giving strength to the killer refrains (“changing me” and “the art of letting go” are among the most effective), another constant in the writing of the Montepulciano band, even if this time the lyric bulimia generates less easy to memorize. The epilogue of the disc is surprising, with the sums orchestrations of “La fog” and the instrumental “is not an end” that does much Exoticrecalling the atmospheres of “The fashion of the slow”. Of Morriconian matrix The other song not sung: “forever”.
At the finish of the tenth studio album (excluding the soundtrack of “Giulia does not come out in the evening”) it is natural to trace a balance of the first 25 years of life of the band. Francesco Bianconi continues not to chase the reassurances of very contemporary pop (he talks about it in “the imitation of love”), rather tries to generate reflections, even on political-ecological themes (it happens in “Green song, toxic love”), made up slender compositions with accessible sound. Bianconi was unable to achieve the most ambitious goals that had placed himself: he is not (for now) that has become the new De André, he is not (for now) who became the new Gainsbourg, and he could have could, the premises were very valid.
Up to “ghost” he won all the stages, then he started to make more difficult to expand the audience of the fans, and decided to embrace a more (apparently) mode “light”, keeping an enthusiastic audience that follows the baustelle with an immense affection. Rachele Bastreghi and Claudio Brasini remain central in the band's musical economy, while Bianconi joins the writing for his solo albums (in which he is diverting the less sparkling compositions) and that account third parties, rigorously for female voices. The most recent case is “I tried everything”, composed for Patty Pravo, such an autobiographical text as even the same singer would never have been able to do. To continue to pave the path from “Modern Chansonnier” with pride.
06/04/2025
Antonio Santini for SANREMO.FM
