And
The Stars Above is the third album by Armonite, a project based
in Pavia led by composer and keyboardist Paolo Fosso and violinist
Jacopo Bigi with the aim of mixing rock and classical chamber music.
It was released in 2018 on the independent label Cleopatra Records
and recorded with the help of many prestigious guest musicians such
as Alberto Fiorani (bass), Colin Edwin (bass), Giacomo Lampugnani
(bass), Gianmarco Straniero (bass), Corrado Bertonazzi (drums),
Emiliano Cava (drums), Jasper Barendregt (drums), Maria Chiara
Montagnari (vocals) and Diletta Fosso (vocals). The album is almost
completely instrumental and confirms all the good qualities of their
previous works. The art cover by Lele Picà tries to capture the
musical content and probably describes the album better than my
words: the man who waits at a train platform with a balloon in his
hand gives an idea of human activities and of their potential, of the
horizontal dimension of life but also of itsupward
motion... In fact, according to the band, the album was conceived
as an imaginary soundtrack for a spiritual journey in twelve legs,
from the Earth to the stars...
The
opener “The March Of The Stars” starts by violin, piano and
soaring vocals singing the last verses from Dante Alighieri’s
Divine Comedy, then the rhythm section comes in and a
disquieting marching beat leads you to the sidereal horizons where
Love moves the Sun and the other stars...
The
dynamic “Next Ride” takes you further in the infinite space while
the following “District Red” blends classical music and rock with
a touch of exoticism. Then it’s the turn of “Plaza de España”
that begins by a delicate, dreamy piano pattern and slowly develops
into a surreal bolero...
“Clouds
Collide” is a nice, romantic song interpreted by Maria Chiara
Montagnari and dealing with childhood memories and the loss of
innocence where different feelings, dreams and notes roll in the sky
like clouds clashing into each other and marking Time with a
fragrance of Love...
The
nervous “Blue Curaçao” follows and leads to “By Heart” that
combines acoustic atmospheres and a touch of electronica. “Freaks”
starts by a soft piano pattern before turning into more experimental
territories while “By The Waters Of Babylon” is a melancholic,
acoustic piece with a mysterious atmosphere...
Armonite 2018
“The
Usual Drink” is a short, delicate piece for piano and violin with a
particular Mid-European flavour that contrasts with the frenzied mood
of the following “What's The Rush?”. The evocative “Ghosts”
closes the journey while the last two pieces, “A Playful Day (for
Strings Quartet)” and “The Fire Dancer (for Piano Solo)” are
considered bonus tracks.
On
the whole, I enjoyed the album and I think that it’s a really good
work.
A Lifelong Journey is the brainchild of Mauro Mugiati (vocals, keyboards, bass, acoustic guitars) and Brian Belloni (electric and acoustic guitars, lap steel guitar, drums), two talented musicians from Pavia both members of Beggar’s Farm, one of the best known Italian Jethro Tull’s tribute bands. In 2019 the two young multi-instrumentalists felt the need to express their own skills as composers and song-writers and self-released an interesting eponymous debut album where they blended vintage and modern sounds, inspired by historic bands from the seventies such as Genesis, Yes or Procol Harum but also by the likes of Spock’s Beard or Steven Wilson. In my opinion, the result of their efforts is very good!
The album was conceived as a long suite in thirteen parts telling about a metaphorical journey across the circle of life, a kind of metaphorical quest for freedom and self-realisation. It begins by a short, dreamy instrumental section entitled “Overture” leading to the pulsing “Streets Of Empathy” that introduces the subject matter. Time has come to find your way and now you are walking on your own on the streets of the world following your dreams and feeling empathy for travellers, voyagers, beggar men and everybody else who dares to defy conformism although many people can’t understand it…
The following section is the delicate “The Shadow” that features a nice strummed acoustic guitar pattern in the background and echoes of Genesis and Procol Harum. You’re still not far from home and already the colours you can see all around you make you perceive different sounds and feelings. The music and lyrics here evoke the fear of breaking bounds, the ghosts from the past, the need to carry on and the pressure of choices to make to find a way to escape from a prison located inside your head...
Then comes a nervous section entitled “Illusion” that describes the feeling of loosing touch with reality driving you where you can hide from other people. You experience the illusion of freedom as you’re spinning fast, upside down, falling deep into your self-consciousness… On the following section, “Reality”, the illusion melts but you’re still building a prison in your head, brick after brick, despite the desire to break free standing proudly on your feet. The land of your dreams is very difficult to reach indeed! “The Shadow (Reprise)” is a dreamy finale for the first half of the album with a backing strummed acoustic guitar and a soaring electric guitar solo. Well, you think you’ve caught the change, you made it and now you feel free...
The second part of the suite (or side B if you prefer) begins by a dark piano solo pattern that leads to the melancholic thoughts and sensations of “Reflections From The Window” where pain is waiting for you in black circles surrounding your head. Deceiving pictures and tricky words run free, breaking the silence. Out of the window the rain is falling down on a tree, time passes slowly and you’re loosing your balance as your dreams seem to turn into nightmares… Threatening organ waves take you to the next section entitled “Disillusion”. Take a look at yourself, where are you’re heading now? Time is running out and you can’t let it break you, you’re tempted to give up and turn back but don’t let your regrets change your mind, don’t surrender to the tide! Disillusion was the price to pay for your dreams and now there’s no time to waste, you know you can still be master of your fate...
A Lifelong Journey 2019
Then comes “Fate” with a martial pace and filtered vocals. Someone is asking for help, restless and lonely just like you were. The next section, “Open Up”, brings a calm, dreamy atmosphere and features strummed acoustic guitar and piano. All alone, in your own dimension you’ve been fighting the world to find your soul. In the fight you thought to have found your own way but you lost stability and balance and now you feel confused. You can’t just drift away, you have to open up and don’t let your ego mislead you. But time is running out and you realize that you’ll never find your peace of mind. You have to say goodbye, you’re going to die tonight and there’s nothing left to try...
The section entitled “Where We Belong” expresses in music and words regrets and nostalgia. You spotted happiness in a glimpse of light, there was another way to break the chain, there were other ways to live a better life and to deserve a better fate. Now you’re giving up, you can fight no more, tonight you are walking through an unknown door… You’re still so far from home and the colours around you have no light nor sound. The sky is falling, don’t look back! It’s the end of your lifelong journey and you’re nothing but the shadow of the man you were. In the darkness you’re going back where we all belong… Then the frenzied instrumental section enitled “Memories” leads to the finale, “Streets Of Empathy (Reprise)”. It’s the end of the road, the end of all the pain and you’re moving on, along the streets of empathy. The circle closes...
On the whole, a very good album that deserves a try! To perform it live Mauro Mugiati and Brian Belloni have recruited two additional members, Sergio Ponti (drums – from Beggar’s Farm too) and Leonardo Barbierato (bass). So, if you have the chance, don’t miss one of their concerts.
Armonite
began life in Pavia in 1996 and in 1999 released an interesting debut
album entitled Inuit on the independent label Mellow Records.
After a long hiatus, in 2014 the band came back to life on the
initiative of Paolo Fosso (keyboards) and Jacopo Bigi (electric
violin), two classical trained musicians in love with rock and modern
audio-visual arts. For the recording sessions of their new album, The
Sun Is New Each Day, thanks to the new technologies who allow
working via internet, the line up was temporarily completed with the
contribute of British bassist Colin Edwin (from Porcupine Tree) and
Dutch drummer Jasper Barendregt while the guest Marcello Rosa played
cello on two tracks. The album was produced, engineered and mixed by
Paul Reeve in Cornwall, mastered by Geoff Pesche at the Abbey Road
Studios in London and finally digitally self-released in 2015 on
bandcamp with a nice art work by Cyril Rolando a.k.a. AquaSixio.
The
album features nine relatively short instrumental tracks where violin
and keyboards perfectly interact with each other weaving charming
melodic lines backed by the tight rhythm section. The classical
influences are strong but always mixed with gusto and extravaganza,
there are no long suites and although the pieces are not overtly
complex they are never banal and the music flows away without weak
moments. According to the band, some of the pieces were conceived as
short soundtracks and some videos were shot to complete in some way
the music. It's the case of the nice opener "Suitcase War",
suspended between classical tradition and modernity, where you can
see in the video the band performing in a virtual, empty opera theatre with the
help of a remote drummer...
The
following "Connect Four" blends touches of electronica, a
bit of folk and brushes of classical taste and leads to the frenzied
"G as in Gears" that features a short narrative
vocal part evoking a commuter's routine, then comes "Sandstorm"
that conjures up Oriental sceneries and ethnic flavours... The
overall sound is well refined and the songwriting brilliant and full
of nuances, although every now and again light reminiscences of albums such as
Jet Leg by Premiata Forneria Marconi or Florian by Le
Orme could come to mind the band sound modern and not stuck in
the past at all.
The disquieting "Slippery Slope", the
dreamy "Satellites", the hectic "Die Grauen Herren",
the delicate, romantic "Le temps qui fait ta rose" and the
conclusive, video-game inspired "Insert Coin" complete a coherent and cohesive
set that in my opinion is really worth listening to.
The
aim of the band is to play their music live as much as possible,
that's why you can legally download the complete album for free: the musicians
just hope that you will enjoy the music and spread the word out to help them
to find gigs around the world, so... Well, have a try and judge by
yourselves!
From Lecco, heading north east, we go now to SONDRIO, a town situated in Valtellina, in the heart of the Alps, which during the seventies gave us a band called La Pentola di Papin. Today it’s the time of the jazz-rock sound of Fetish Panda(MySpace) and of the young, promising The Cinema Show (Facebook), the latter from the near town of Tirano.
From Sondrio we head south to BERGAMO, the birthplace of the famous opera composer Gaetano Donizetti. Today in Bergamo opera and prog can merge with the operatic vocals of tenor Mauro Ghilardini and his prog opera project Minstrel(Official Website). In the past Bergamo gave us bands such as I Raminghi, Madrugada, Perdio and Mo.Do. Now we find bands such as the excellent La Torre dell’Alchimista(Official Website), Prowlers(MySpace) and Tilion(MySpace).
Prowlers’ and Tilion’s keyboardist Alfio Costa (MySpace) recently also started two side projects, one is the symphonic Colossus Project (MySpace) that in 2010 released a debut album on Musea Records while the other is the more experimental Daal (MySpace) featuring Roman drummer Davide Guidoni.
Bergamo is also home to two interesting folk rock bands, Lingalad(Official Website), a band inspired by the work of J.R.R. Tolkien who in 2010 released a good album on Lizard Records, La locanda del vento, and the folk-metal Folk Stone(MySpace). Other local bands that deserve mentioning in my opinion are Sandcastle (MySpace), Timeline (Facebook), Empyreum (MySpace), Heliantus (MySpace) and Darshan(MySpace).
Not far from Bergamo lies BRESCIA, known as the “Leonessa d’Italia” (the Lioness of Italy) after ten days of popular uprising that took place in the city in the spring of 1849 against Austrian rule. From here in the seventies there came a band called Dalton. For prog lovers now Brescia is the city of bands such as Notabene(MySpace), Corte Aulica (MySpace) and other projects of drummer and composer Gustavo Pasini, such as Lithos and Alma Sideris(MySpace). When visiting Brescia, have a break and listen to some good music while having a drink or eating something at the Canterbury Café, the owner is Gustavo Pasini himself.
From Brescia come also one of the most interesting emerging bands of the Italian prog scene, Del Maiale Non Si Butta Via Niente (Facebook) who are working on their debut album, then Moogg(Official Website), Phoenix Again (MySpace), Psycho Praxis (Facebook), the prog folk La Cantina di Ermete (MySpace), Desma (Reverbnation), Born Idol (Facebook) and Diamante(MySpace), heavy prog oozing love for Uriah Heep. Chiari, a town nearby Brescia, is the birthplace of musician, composer, producer and former PFM member Mauro Pagani(Official Website). Well, in Chiari there was a bakery called Forneria Marconi that inspired the name of the most famous Italianprog band. In 2009 Mauro Pagani also wrote a novel set in the Italian prog scene of the seventies, Foto di gruppo con chitarrista.
Back west now, to PAVIA, 35 km south of Milan, which in the past gave us I Numi, Armonite and a band linked to the right wing movements called Acroama(MySpace). Well, Acroama recently reformed and are working on new stuff. Today here we can also listen to a band called A Lifelong Journey (Facebook), to the prog folk of Andrea Vercesi (MySpace) and, from an area called Lomellina, to a young band called Corvi di Pietra (MySpace).
Nearby Pavia, in the town of Vigevano there are the headquarters of the independent label Ma.Ra.Cash Records, specialized in prog. Vigevano is also the hometown of bands such as Mary Newsletter (MySpace) and Jester’s Joke. Then, east of Pavia lies LODI where we can listen to Sintonia Distorta (Facebook) and Liquid Clock(MySpace), a band that have been active since 2007 blending jazz/rock and funky grooves with many other influences. In 2010 they released their first self-produced album, Sense of self.
Still heading east we reach CREMONA, best known for its musical instrument manufacturer: this is the city of the Amati family, Guarneri and Stradivari. Here we can listen to prog bands and artists such as Mappe Nootiche(MySpace), Freeway Jam (Facebook) Hoverplain (Facebook), Master Prova (MySpace) and Mario Cottarelli (MySpace) while the nearby town of Crema in the recent past gave us a band called Vedda Tribe.
Still heading east we conclude our visit to Lombardia in MANTOVA, the city of the classical Roman poet Virgil. Here there are based bands such as Moongarden(MySpace), Submarine Silence(MySpace), Blaze (Facebook), Obscura(MySpace), Catafalchi del Cyber (MySpace) and the psychedelic Baba Jaga(MySpace).
