Moreno: “I was the Napoleon of the rap scene: an exile”

The latest album by Moreno dates back to 2016, it is “Slogan”. The new single, “Ah however soda” with Clementino and Ada Reina, just released, marks a new beginning for his career. “I'm working on a new album, this is just a first step for me it is a return, a rebirth”, the Genoese rapper enthusiastically admits. But in between, in these eight years, what happened? Some singles, some collaborations, lots of television and shows, but above all the need, says Moreno, for the times to ripen.

“My participation and victory at Friends in 2013 it changed everything – the rapper rewinds the tape – I have been a scapegoat and a sacrificial lamb because I was the first. To me that participation was not forgiven because I came from a rap scene that was very different from today's, and even the genre certainly wasn't as successful as it is these days. By winning, I found myself with a completely different audience compared to that of battle or freestyle where I had achieved great goals…”. Member of Ultimi AED, a seminal group for the Genoese rap scene, freestyle champion in the Tecniche Perfette competition, Moreno found himself projected into another planet, almost antithetical, in those years, to the one in which he had grown up. And in fact the reasoning continues: “Do you know how we understand that times have changed? From social media. To the rappers who finish or stand out in talent today we get compliments. 'Insults weigh less on you when you become an adult', I rapped on Amici on a version of ''O sole mio'. Well, that's exactly what happened to her. I knocked down walls, I literally sacrificed myself so that certain doors could open, but at that time the situation was not as clear as it is today. Maybe some time had to pass for everything to reconcile…for a long time I felt like an exile, a Napoleon Bonaparte of the rap scene”.

But he doesn't point fingers. “There is no blame or responsibility, this is how it works in Italy: many changes of pace arrive late… and are understood late, I have no regrets”, she underlines. What made him want to come back? “For me, this new single is like setting off on a journey, getting on the rap scene bus and taking my place back – he continues – I had started working on an EP some time ago, but then the songs increased and so, naturally, the idea of a record, which will be full of surprises. There is a vision, there is a new team, there are all the right ingredients to do well. I worked hard during the pandemic, I wrote a lot. And what gave me courage, paradoxically, was the Baby Gang diss track, to which I wanted to respond. By replying to him, with my bars, it is as if I had responded to all those who have had my name in their mouths in recent years, discrediting me for no reason. It was an outlet that made me understand that it was right to go back to making musicor what I have always loved.”