Anastasio: “After X Factor they shredded me, now the point above”

In 2018 the victory at X Factor. A lightning and overflowing success at twenty years because, in that talent, it is the first rapper to reach that summit. Then singles, EP, hosted at the Sanremo Festival until the actual race in 2020 with the song “Rosso di Rabbia”, with which he ranks thirteenth at the end of the event. It ends in a media storm due to some alleged likes to political pages lined to the right. For Anastasio, that time remains suspended, in a bubble. He stayed inside a turbine and, despite trying to make music, nothing more as he would like. Three years after “Mielemedicine”, he returns with a new album “Machines cannot pray”, which comes out for Woodworm on April 11. “The record I always wanted to do.” It is a return, a rebirth. And it’s not a matter of audience or numbers, but personal.

Are you tense?
Yes, I’m a little tense. For five years I have this album in my head, between speeches, expectations, mutations, ideas. The album has changed over time, but the basic idea did not come out like a flash after some speeches made with his friend and poet Davide Note. The ending of the disc arrived over time. In my opinion, a work of art should be born.

Is it a disc in?
Yes, the first song I wrote was “La Mosca”. Davide then put on suggestions on the table, mixing the history of Charles Baudelaire with that of cyber-cyclopes. A story that starts since 1848, from the riots. The main theme is precisely the revolt, against themselves and against society. A revolt that leads to solitude. What makes me proud is that this album has an ending, which gives the feeling of having listened to a story.

The technology is very present on the disc: is it, as Marracash says, who have become algorithms?
There are many themes that overlap. Baudelaire in 1848 witnesses a revolt that in the center puts the spectrum of a man who risks turning into the car. It is the first time that has happened. That automated intention of the machines remains unchanged, still today. “Objects have the desire to be alive, while the living turn into objects” I think it is one of the symbol phrases to understand the question. But I want to specify one thing: I am not a Luddist, or a person who hates technology.

Also because we are talking through zoom …
Clear. The problem is not the means, it is not technology, but how it is used.

“Anastasio has not disappeared, he took time to live,” reads the launch of your album.
Of the success I had I enjoyed very little. I was not good. At least the luxury of taking time … I took it. But it was not an act of courage. When an artist stops he says: “Ah, what courage”. I couldn’t help but stop, it wasn’t a matter of courage. I needed that time to write.

Where did the pressure come from? From discography?
If I told you yes I would be false. It wasn’t like that. The records can work badly, but they are not orcs, they don’t whip you. Nobody ever forced me to do anything. The pressure came from inside, from expectations, from always being up to par. And so I accepted the idea of ​​stopping, I wanted to free myself from that parasite that says “performing, performing”.

When you say you have badly experienced success to what do you refer to? Ax Factor? In Sanremo? To the hunt for the witches in which you finished when they said you sympathized for the radical right? Or a little bit all of this?
A little bit of everything. I found myself in identity crisis. In the first piece of the album, “La Mosca”, I say: “Since everyone pays attention, I feel more misunderstood than ever”. Being in the spotlight, always talking, doing interviews with shitty questions to give answers of shit … all that fame felt that she had arrived for the wrong reasons. This is the point. There was a great misunderstanding. I would have liked to make a record like this … I put a tide of time, but I made it (smiles, editor’s note).

“Hypocrite brother” what song is it? Is it a slap?
It is the most hip hop piece of the disc. He is a great slap in everything, as you said. It’s a take off everything …

How did you work at the sound level?
This is a discometria. The first part is more acoustic, the second is more electronic. Every sound marries the words. Each sound supports the meaning. I did all this record without manager, without label, with nothing. It all arrived later. Woodworm listened to the album and liked him. He was born while I was totally alone, I did not work to do singles, but to do something that made me enjoy, he made me feel good.

Already in the past you had greeted you with the majors …
Yes, it was a common decision.

After your participation in X Factor, did something change in rap in your opinion? Do you feel part of the rap scene?
The times were ripe when I went to X Factor, and in fact after me the rap exploded in the talent, it reached everyone. I think I have been important for that type of phenomenon. I was a boy, I was twenty years old. I felt omnipotent. I went out and shreded me from all points of view. But even before I was in conflict with rap. Every time I attended the provincial rap world I found people who were playing a role, today instead it seems to me there is a different spontaneity, even if some masks remained. I’ve never felt a character, I don’t go around with the gang. I do mine, I can’t tell certain realities. I represent more, I try to aim high.