Thursday 28 August 2014

KILLING TIME

Tacita Intesa come from the Casentino Valley, in the province of Arezzo, and are based in the little town of Subbiano. The band began life in 2012 with a line up featuring Alessandro Granelli (guitar, vocals), Filippo Colongo (guitar), Daniele Stocchi (keyboards), Thomas Crocini (bass) and Pasquale Balzano (drums). They were influenced by seventies prog and hard rock but managed to add a very personal touch to their original compositions. In 2014 they self-released an interesting eponymous debut album that sounds fresh and that is really worth listening to. The beautiful art work by keyboardist Daniele Stocchi in some way depicts the content of the music and lyrics, focused on the relationship between nature and science, progress and environment...


The excellent opener “Ciutikutown” is a complex track divided into three parts featuring a space rock atmosphere that perfectly fits the lyrics. The first one, Robotomia, depicts in music and words a robot picking up a beautiful, magical rose: it's the flower of life! In this way the robot breaks free from the chains of science. The second part, Epifania, describes the mystical rose breathing a new energy into the robot, its vibrations seem almost talking to him revealing the mystery of life and dissolving the shadows of the darkest arcane. The last part, Metamorfia, is a bluesy instrumental section that describes the transformation of the robot into a human being.

Tacita Intesa on stage

Daigo” is a beautiful, short instrumental track with a melancholic atmosphere. Try to imagine a ship sailing across the Pacific Ocean, there are magnificent, breathtaking landscapes in the background and an impending sense of tragedy in the air... In fact, along with the following “Valzer della Morte” (Death's Waltz), this piece was inspired by the story of the Daigo Fukuryū Maru, a Japanese tuna fishing boat which was exposed to and contaminated by nuclear fallout from the United States' Castle Bravo thermonuclear device test on Bikini Atoll, on March 1, 1954. The music and lyrics of “Valzer della Morte” depict in a poetical way that disaster conjuring up invisible lights, a sudden explosion and a cruel, evil flower stretching out its black petals, a tree of light and the dark fate looming over the twenty-three men of the crew, victims of the merciless bomb. Two great tracks!


Next comes “Portmanteau”, a short, aggressive track with a strong theatrical approach and a cabaret atmosphere featuring strange, cryptic lyrics dealing with the necessity of hiding yourself behind a mask of nonsense and the will to conform the chaos. It leads to the dreamy “Corona” (Crown) that deals with the harmony between Heaven and Earth. Here the lyrics describe a glance towards the sky to admire a beautiful crown of light and clouds, a gift coming from a lost paradise where ancient gods used to celebrate the poets and look at men with indulgence.

Terzo rigo quarta parola” (Third line fourth word) is another excellent track where the borders between past and present are blurred and time stands still. In a new world you can fly high like a golden angel drawn by a galactic vortex of life that fades into the deep... “I've killed the god of Time / Tired of trembling...”.


The surreal “Periodo refrattario” (Refractory period) concludes this interesting work. It's an instrumental piece divided into six parts that tries to describe a world dominated by media and consumerism where people seem to have lost the sense of critical thought. Try to imagine a strange factory producing heads in series, there are queues in series... Assembly and welding follow, just before the final packaging and shipping!

On the whole, I think that this is a very good album from a very promising band. You can listen to the complete album and download it for free, so have a try and if you like it ask the band for the physical copy!

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