Berlusconi’s death is for many the end of an oppression, for others the end of a hope, for all it is an end. We are faced with the disappearance of a Lynchian character who for years has modeled Italians in his image and likeness by modifying their psyche, so much so that even his opponents, almost all taken by a surreal grief, seem to move like his pawns. By now the late Silvio is in their DNA. In his diabolical design of consumerist paradises based on an astonishing and artificially constructed well-being, every means had to be used to its maximum effectiveness to reach the ultimate goal: to win you over and make you bear the emptiness with a smile on your lips. Communication, marketing, video, cinema, television, cartoons, even the Greek theatre, all made soup.
Music too had its importance in Berlusconi’s great factory of dreams, but its role was diminished, as if it were a whim and nothing more. And instead we are here to talk about one of the operations that have contributed to influencing the sound tastes of the peninsula up to the current and worrying national pop panorama: let’s talk about Five Record.
Label founded by Berlusconi and initially born to promote the programs of his networks by publishing the acronyms, then takes a different turn, essentially strategic in penetrating the musical tastes of Italians. The characteristic of Five, at the beginning, was to address an audience of very old and very young people, without half measures. The identity is shaped in particular by the expert hands of Augusto Martelli, our “Zappa lounge”, an absolute champion. First to do so among the homegrown labels, Five Record knowingly pushes, and bribes, on the acronyms of cartoons by electing Cristina D’Avena as queen of the genre, effectively giving her a monopoly. No more ghost bands created by the best session men, no more experimentation more or less hidden under pseudonyms, the acronyms are interpreted by a pop star in the flesh, a recognizable character on whom to transfer one’s television passions as little children of Canale 5.
Cristina D’Avena sells about six million records while the discography that counts looks at her sufficiently because she makes stuff for children (Dalla is one of the few to recognize her an important place in the history of Italian music by declaring that she wants to write for her). At the same time, the label signs some Italian pop caryatids, which apparently makes no sense. Why have people who have already been downloaded by others to record records because they no longer sell?
And instead the move is clever: it covers the pool of the nostalgic elderly and allows you to give yourself a minimum of “authorial” demeanor, buying the trust of artists in a certain sense at the barrel of the gas. We remember Bruno Lauzi (who despite being from the liberal area was absolutely not a fan of Berlusconi) and the very communist Gino Paoli who recorded a couple of albums for Five with which he will return to the charts and which will lay the foundations for the newfound commercial success of Four friends at the bar. Or Orietta Berti (also a “redhead” from the family), who despite everything has managed to keep up until today and indeed, is now in all respects very popular (see the single with Lauro and Fedez).
It is not important that in the stable there are crippled horses like Maurizio Vandelli, ex Equipe 84, the New Angels, Mino Reitano or Bobby Solo and Little Tony. It is not important that the very young are considered as eternal Peter Pans incapable of emancipating themselves from the Bee Hive (the fake ones who replace the punk look with fluorescent sweatshirts for paninari). The important thing is to control the audience ratings, trying to maintain a sort of continuity between generations, linking them by the Biscione’s philosophy of life: a world in which everything tends towards Hyperborea, where everything is perfect and free from contradictions.
In a short time, the field where Arcorian hedonism is best expressed becomes that of Italo disco: we find in the catalog Mauro Malavasi’s Change (among the few Italians capable of making inroads in the Billboard charts), O’Ggar, a Brando who as leader of the psychobilly Boppin’ Kids brazenly gives himself to the dance floor or hybrid acts between Italo and new wave that smell of burnt plastic, like Robert Bauer or the Fitz of the catchphrase Audio/Videowhich somehow follow the turn of Gaznevada, the one that leads right from post punk to dance.
It is precisely in Eurodance that Five Record collects the greatest international successes, above all with the exploit of Sabrina Salerno. From a sloppy soubrette she reinvents herself as a sparkling singer and manages to conquer the European charts by imposing a model in all respects adhering to Berlusca-thinking: a sunny, uninhibited girl, a carefree and busty material girl, who sings even without a voice, recovering in this the “sticazzi” of punk (it is no coincidence that he will duet with Jo Squillo) and that makes boys dream, who spend more time in the bathroom with his photos than in the living room with his records.
She is the perfect female model of Berlusconi and will have followers without the same success as Tina, Monique or Angela Cavagna, the majority of Bagaglino; Sabrina’s music, on the other hand, works because she is a concentrate of instrument presets, all absolutely automated, all explicitly fake, a real muzak for a world completely addicted to the concept of vapor pleasure (let’s not forget that Stock, Aitken & Waterman will produce them All of Me almost simultaneously with Success of Sigue Sigue Sputnik).
Five could not fail to filter with the new summer of love, obviously in its own way. The house peeks out in the label’s repertoire and it is driven by a “transversal” comedian: Francesco Salvi, who in addition to being a symbol of the avant/demented laughter of Drive Inuses a sound that until then was alien to Italians. We have to move a carbasically a cover of The Party by Kraze, becomes a huge success in Italy. Other records of the genre will follow, such as those of Double Dee. Even Jovanotti, although under the wing of Cecchetto’s FRI, will rely on Five. And speaking of Cecchetto, it is precisely from Berlusconi’s idea that the DJs slowly transform themselves into television presenters, with a frankly inexplicable passage. But anyhow: if we listen to the Fivemix Special Dee Jay we find for example Carlo Conti, who is still a dj/aspiring Italo disco singer. Gerry Scotti singer will become despite him, for a couple of house-like singles associated with his programs, despite being out of tune as a bell.
Precisely for this reason, to tell the truth, the Five sound is not stuff that we can simply define as danceable, commercial, cheesy, glossy. It is actually extreme, amphetamine-like music, almost a harsh noise version of pop, a consumer music that consumes itself, uses and throws away continuously and then resurrects with the aim of disintegrating every neuronal trace to let only what is found speak “from the waist down” (as Ruggeri would say).
If we look among the names in the catalog we also find unsuspected characters, one for all Andrea Centazzo, who after delighting us in the 70s with an avant jazz record like Stroke and with his participations in the works of John Zorn, Don Cherry, Marc Ribot, we find him in Five with the album The near future. Or a Carlo Siliotto from the Canzoniere del Lazio who peeps out with the soundtrack of Four little women. There is also room for an attempt at a “new author song” in the Teen 5 economic series. Characters such as Massimiliano Cattapani (discovered and produced by Alberto Radius) or Valentina Gautier (author for Mina) we remember them for having then weighed in the context Italian pop either as authors or as producers (Paolo Carta for example will bond with Laura Pausini, becoming her producer), without however leaving their mark in the slightly more “cultured” context in which they wanted to be inserted.
When the mainstream music world in the 90s is feeding on the alternative scene, people like Rossovivo appear, under the aegis of Claudio Cecchetto and his label. But the public didn’t fall for it, so much so that the band, at a concert, found themselves in front of 20 people, the singer refused to play and Cecchetto unloaded them as indeed was Berlusconi’s practice when the artist didn’t obey. Listening flop also for Memorabilia, authors of a crossover with not bad ideas but obviously massacred by an “advertising” production, or for Ascot, “beehivized” Moda ignored by public and critics. They are all bands that have an extremely amateur basic taste, but which, wanting to be careful, anticipate the Måneskin high school gym rocket that works all too well today, a sign that Five sensed a drop in public attention to incredible levels. People are tired of reasoning, they just want quick products, passing music and the underground world too will soon end up the same way, because basically everyone wants to feel good and be bought like footballers (future members of X Factor of certain characters confirm this prediction).
Five sells mirages, an effort to erase any discomfort, any conflict from the minds of the listeners, reduced to passive consumers. So here’s the label turning into RTI Music and acting with the ambition to give people exactly what they want: once again looking back to the classics, this time betting on winning horses to be on the safe side. Mia Martini, Patty Pravo, Pietra Montecorvino, Celentano. And it grabs the teenager market, breaking it. The signing of 883 and Ambra was decisive, forever marking the imagination of a generation of teenagers who had already been fed on bread and Song of the Smurfs.
However, it is sensational that the definitive disc was not recorded on Five, i.e. the songs by Berlusconi-Apicella, it was preferred to publish them for Universal, but the court of bootlickers failed to give the record success to its broadcasting. And it was a missed opportunity to convince him to give up his hobby of disintegrating this poor country and to devote himself instead to singing, which was his first love when he and Confalonieri gave him down on cruise ships. Berlusconi personally took care of the label, the choice of artists, the jingles that were his strength, understanding the tastes and expectations of the average public, who always wanted current things, while he didn’t like them at all.
Here, Five’s music defined the current events of those who hated current events: they used a sound, they didn’t create it, they demolished it only to build worse, as is done with contracts after an earthquake. Five Record is the classic example of a dream that soon turns into a nightmare: a label that seems to have been set up in two minutes by rich burinozzi looking for the typical legitimacy of the majors. It’s not about trash, it’s about an arrogant attitude widespread today of which they were prime movers. Herein lies its disturbing charm, herein lies the secret of an entire catalog that can be summarized in a jingle: that of Canale 5 by Augusto Martelli, born as a joke after a joke by Berlusca. It would have ended up in the toilet, if the Cavaliere hadn’t considered it perfect for the philosophy of an entire operation: that of slipping into our ears forever, like the soundtrack created by an AI of Italian turbo-capitalism.
