Rkomi: “I made the jumping bungee in the abysses”

Rkomi, in “decreasing.”, His new album, is transparent. You can see everything. He tells his life, his family, friendships, loves, lights and shadows of a path that left uphill and who has never stopped testing him. He comes from a Sanremo Festival where more than judged for “the rhythm of things”, he was, in a womb, targeted for his way of speaking. But this did not prevent him from closing an extremely personal and true album, which puts “a point at the head”, like the one at the end of the title of each song. An album that once again shows the strength of his pen and returns an artist who asks to be listened to, carefully, and who, to return to the top, as for the spring effect of the bungee jumping, dived into the abysses.

Is the red thread among all the songs represented by the ties?
As a dear friend of mine said, every song can be seen as a letter to someone. I have never left the ties in my personal life in my personal life. But maybe in music yes, I did it. I talked less about it. Add, add, then at some point you have to go back to what really matters, you have to remove….

The title evokes a “going back”.
I wanted to go back to a state, especially mental, that I had at the beginning in making music. In an interview Pupi Avati speaks of “compensation from life”. After many deprivations, at a certain point I realized that I would have had to earn everything: from the kiss with the first girl, very sweaty, because I was certainly not the beauty of the school, to the work, what we all know, and to music. I had to take certain things with the force. Then I had to grow down, do a particular job. Hence the title. Yes, there is a “going back”, but which is also a criticism of today’s society.

Where in particular?
On the cover certainly. It’s a classy photo of me. There is the moment of the shot, it is obvious, but one cannot fail to think of the moment later, to that of the “now we all go back to our lives”. Also sad. When the lights and flash go out there is more.

When you go back to the roots, it is usually because the road has been lost. Did this happen to you?
Never. “Taxi driver” was a more playful, light, open album. Even if it doesn’t seem to have been a flow of consciousness that album there compared to “decreasing.” in which I thought for a long time what to say and how to say it. In “Taxi driver” I really let myself go. In “decreasing.” I thought more, this is because I care a lot, it is the thirty -year -old album. I took seriously, then I lightened, then apathy came: in “decreasing.” I have lived many phases, but I never lost my compass.

There are pieces as “the last infidelity” and “so small” In which excavations, talk about issues and family events also suffered. How do you get, with awareness, to decide to talk about such delicate issues?
If there hadn’t been a lot of beautiful in my life, I wouldn’t have been able to bring out all this shit. If I hadn’t had full power over me, I wouldn’t have been able to write songs like this. I wouldn’t have been able to criticize myself. I was angry with me for not understanding myself, in love for example. I didn’t want to make fun of myself anymore and in this album I said exactly the things they are.

What else has disappointed you?
The world of music, in general. There is a glossy market … I do this record I said “I want to differentiate myself”. And to do this I had to point the finger on me, not on others. Sometimes I see rappers and not, to make great sprolqui, speaking more than what others do not do well than of themselves. I did another type of work.

It is a record full of electronics. How did you work on the sound?
There is as electronics as possible, aware of the type of disk I was doing. I wanted a truly mine sound that didn’t win the eye on the standards. I realized that the texts were very serious, at the sound level you cannot not take this into account, you cannot do follies. With “Taxi driver” I didn’t look at the abysses, now I want to see only the abysses. Electronics is the focal point, there are very few guitars just to make the opposite of “taxi driver”.

Polar stars?
At the beginning Damon Albarn and Thom Yorke, then Nerd, but in the end I dealt with who I am, on how I sing and what I wanted to express. And no, Thom Yorke, I couldn’t do it (smiles, ed.).

Have you worked for subtraction on music?
Yes, because I had many things to say. I kept my spiced-rapato, to make it emerge a slightly more minimal sound.

Song: “Making music is like a pressure cooker”. What are you referring to?
Meanwhile, this is a job in which in the end you don’t understand fucking. And the more you think you understand, the more at a certain point you realize that it is not so. It was interesting for me to think less and let me take from things. “Making music is like a pressure cooker”, with the handles that burn, as I say, it is a metaphor to say: we try to analyze things a little less and enjoy them more. FAILIZATIONS, WHOWS, everything must be motivated. I repeat: let’s enjoy music more.

At the Sanremo Festival you presented “The rhythm of things”. More than on your song, you have discussed your way of singing, on your language, on the “italic”, even touching very low points that have nothing to do with criticism. Did you remain negatively conditioned?
He shook me. Not positively, not even in the negative. Then he immobilized me. I understand the baseness of certain individuals, but the truth is that I wanted to allow that song to be sung for another five years in my concerts. I wanted to arrive at people, as many people as possible and that they became a first coherent piece … perfectly inserted in this album. I was aware that I was going to Sanremo, but I didn’t want to Do Sanremo, I wanted Do me. Many go to the festival, then the piece presented ends up on a disc that has nothing to do with fucking or the whole disc is ugly.

Pieces like “The rhythm of things” and “10 seconds” remind us of the importance of breathing and not ending up inside the gears?
Yes, I have always been able to do it. I am a party animal, but I also know how to be alone, inside loneliness. For me they must be both sides. I have never had the feeling of not listening to me. Above all, I speak of the haste to have, to do, to choose, to own. Nayt in “10 seconds” entered this speech perfectly in its way. I wanted to say another thing about Sanremo….

Please.
In “hatred, so I’m.” I told this post -meaning company, a society in which people who exhibit are made fun of. And it happened to me too, I was made fun of well. Do you know what I was sorry? That at the end of everything was the song that was affected, the sensations of the song. I tried to say things, even deep….

When these things happen, the chatter on the song wins. Do you remember when Levante was attached because he introduced himself to the blonde festival? His beautiful “alive” piece went into the background.
Certain. You are labeled and there is no one out there.

On this journey you wanted Tedua, Izi, Hernia, Lazza, and Nayt, with whom you shared a lot.
Over the years we have seen each other less. Working on these pieces, doing the sessions, allowed us to see each other more, to promise us to continue doing it. As we did from Piccolini we saw a bang of videos on YouTube. They were fantastic, they got involved, everyone wanted to write, to leave their mark.

This record looks back, but what’s in front of what is it?
This record is not over. I’m not talking about repack or anything else. I really speak of making the story continue. I certainly put a point. For this there is the point even after the title “decreasing.”. This disc is a leap below, it’s a jumping bungee, I’m diving and then, with the spring effect, I go back. I am active, I still have a great desire to tell me.