When Rino Gaetano composed his “Desolation Row”
When in 1975 he pulled out of the cylinder “but the sky is increasingly blue”, Rino Gaetano – to mention the memories of his colleague Ernesto Bassignano – “grazed for some time” in that factory of solid realities, and not of dreams, which was the ITthe record label founded in 1969 by Vincenzo Micocci within the Italian RCA in via Tiburtina. Legend has it that the singer -songwriter of Calabrian origins one day took a guitar of eleven ropes – because the twelfth had jumped – and improvised that torn. Then he went to Arturo Stalteriwho at that time played as a keyboard player in the progressive rock group of Pierrot Lunaire, and asked him a tour of piano agreements such as intro that characterized the piece. “This time he made a bang,” whispered among them the various characters who wandered in the galaxy of the small record company who had the aim of signing and launching the new talents of the Italian author song, speaking of that bizarre artist who had made his bones on the offs off and in the theaters for children of the Roman suburbs, where – to mention a press release that the promoter Michele Mondellagreat employee of the works of those magical and unrepeatable years, he would have spread three years later, when with “Gianna” Gaetano would have managed to conquer the Temple of Sanremo – he had “learned to highlight the message with all the tools of the theater”. That it was actually like this, that is, that Rino Gaetano had actually made “the bang” Micocci realized immediately. But that song required a different process, from those that IT used to publish.
The anecdote and the reprint for the 50 years
Yes, because, evidently very inspired, Rino Gaetano composed a song that went beyond the structure and duration of the form-chanzone: “But the sky is increasingly blue” was a song more than 8 minutes long. To be precise, 8 minutes and 23 seconds. A sort of “desolation row” – Bob Dylan ten years earlier with that song had gone up to 11 minutes and 21 seconds of duration – with which the singer -songwriter started by Crotone to conquer the rankings He spoke of people, behaviors and vices, but without judging, without pointing the finger, limiting himself to listing a whole series of human categories. “Those who live in the shack, those who sweat wages / who loves love and dreams of glory / who steals pensions, who has little memory”. And again: “Who eats once, who pulls to the target / who wants the increase, who plays Sanremo”. It was Micocci himself, according to the chronicles, the idea of Divide the song into two parts, “but the sky is increasingly blue – part i” and “but the sky is increasingly blue – part II”, respectively side A and side B than a 45 laps that was printed in the spring of 1975 But that – thanks to the push of the few free radios of the time – conquered the Hitparade more or less in this period, close to the summer. An anniversary that Sony Music has decided to celebrate by publishing the 45 laps of the song for the first time in blue vinyl and a definitively numbered blue vinyl collection that brings together all the versions of the song.
“Who plays in Sanremo”
The original 45 laps sold the beauty of 100 thousand copiesallowing Rino Gaetano to attract the attention of the general public on himself for the first time. The music of the singer -songwriter reflected the chaos and uncertainty of the 70s in Italy, but did it with a lightness and genius that made it unique: “There are sad or useless, but never happy images, as I wanted to emphasize that nowadays there are few things of cheerful things and this is why I take into account those who die at work, who wants the increase – he told him at the time – even the verse” Whoever plays in Sanremo “is sad and negative, because whoever plays in Sanremo do not think of those who live in the shack”. With “But the sky is increasingly blue” Gaetano, who was 24 years old at the time, succeeded, as his nephew Alessandro, son of his sister Anna recalls and today custodian of the artistic heritage of his uncle (is the frontman of the Rino Gaetano Band, the only official tribute band of the singer -songwriter), to “capture the human soul in its complexity, revealing dreams, hopes and internal struggles that make us all a little closer and at the same time more distant».
The exploit of an irregular
“But the sky is increasingly blue” made the free poetry and the unmistakable stamp of the Calabrian artist known to Italy, preparing the ground for the success of the album “My brother is the only child“, Which would come out the following year, and to the consecration. That would have arrived in Sanremo, with” Gianna “, in ’78.” He does not deceive the immediate popularity of his songs: there is a lot of wisdom in the use of irony, sarcasm, calembour, nonsense, in that particular means of communication that is the song, always willing to take a serious reason, Even when it comes to an operetta, “he said to him at the time.In Parabola di Rino Gaetano he would have consumed, as known, too quickly. A car accident in 1981 would have put the word “end” to its existence earlier than expected. Too much earlier than expected. Over forty years after that tragic accident, “But the sky is increasingly blue” continues to be, perhaps, his most misunderstood, misunderstood and even abused song. For years, parties and politicians have been appropriate, making it listen to during their gatherings and their rallies, trying to transform it into a manifesto of their ideas and visions. Too bad that Rino Gaetano himself claimed to have never talked about politics in his “ballads” (as he defined his songs): “When I sang I was trying, if anything, always to make the evasive».
