The unpredictable Friday of Italian rap

After Kanye West’s surreal performance at the Forum in Milan, we return to talking about music, specifically rap and urban, starting from three singles, all different from each other, but all equally interesting. A photograph of how much a certain world is capable of shuffling cards, to play with sound and involve various protagonists. Today, February 23, is an unpredictable Friday. We move from the return of “In Italia” by Fabri Fibra to the new and unexpected journey into the human depth with Mace, accompanied by Salmo and Centomilacarie, a meeting between generations. But it’s also there Stabber, he also experiments on the production side and calls together Coez, Gemitaiz, Noyz Narcos. “In Italia 2024” by Fibra, this time accompanied by Baby Gang and Emmawhich takes up the refrain sung at the time by Gianna Nannini,” is the demonstration of how a song, at a distance of 17 years since its publicationmay still have something to say enough to be able to make its own way and make everyone feel the need to be reborn in a new version, with new voices and new rhymes”, said Fibra. In the bars, updated, but not even that much, with some themes that have sadly remained current, a dark country is photographedgoverned by malfeasance, with a pressing beat that seems to recall “We Will Rock You” by Queen.

And then, suddenly, the Psalm you don’t expect. The one who raps on “I don’t recognize myself”Mace’s new single, is less explosive than usual: the rhymes of the Sardinian rapper, wanted by the Milanese producer at his side together with the revelation One hundred thousand caries (real name Simone Colamussi, 18 year old from Milan signed by Maciste Dischi, the label that in recent years has launched – among others – Gazzelle and Fulminacci), I’m not exactly at TNT, as one would expect from someone like Salmo. This time the rapper of “1984” aims for more intimate and reflective atmospheresin line with minimal – and cinematic, sounds

the beautiful video clip of the song, written and directed by Ludovico Di Martino, Roman, former director of the third season of “Skam Italia”as well as “The beast” and “The travellers: the theme is the search for one’s identity – chosen by Mace, reduced to the bare bones to highlight so much the vocal timbre of Centomilacarie as much as that of Salmo himself: “On the top floor, hanging upside down / ready to take a dive where the sky is bluest / I can scream until God hears me / no one here really loves me, especially me,” he raps, in the second half of the piece. After “La canzone nostra”, the result of the meeting with Salmo himself and Blanco which earned him 6 platinum recordsunleashed, Mace once again confirms his unpredictability and ability to find an interesting balance in the unprecedented juxtaposition of apparently distant voices, generations and imaginaries.

However, the imagery of Coez, Gemitaiz and Noyz Narcos are not distant. The three rappers, in different ways considered sacred monsters of the Roman rap scene, were put together in a song Stabberreal name Stefano Tartaglini, 43 year old producer among the most active on the circuit, alongside them Coez and Gemitaiz, Nitro, Coma Cose, Night Skinny, Ensi. In “Never Hate” the three heavyweights of Capitoline rap each do what they do best: Coez returns to being the “chorus” of the times of the Vicious Circle and the Brokenspeakers (that’s what they called him when in the 2000s he wrote some of the most impactful pages of Capitoline rap with the two groups – the choruses bore his signature and his melodic streak then began to come out in a more decisive way starting from the turning point with “Ali dirty”, in 2011),

Gemitaiz and Noyz Narcos share the two verses, which they interpret with their respective – and very recognizable – styles. Distorted bass and dilated synthesizers create the perfect musical carpet for a nocturnal song, sexy and rough at the same time, which is the comfort zone of all three protagonists. A detail that is not insignificant: in “Non odire mai” Silvano Albanese, Davide De Luca and Emanuele Frasca reunite for the first time on the same track. A small event.