Review Summary: One of the best fusions between rock and classical music. Another obscure work that deserves to be discovered.
“Il Paese Dei Balocchi” is the eponymous debut and only studio album of Il Paese Dei Balocchi and was released in 1972. The line up on the album is Fabio Fabiani, Armando Paone, Marcello Martorelli and Sanaro Laudadio.
We are in 1972, a true very prolific year for the Italian prog rock scene. This is the year of many of the greatest prog masterpieces of the Italian prog. Just to name a few of them and the most important, we have the homonymous debut album and “Darwin” of Banco Del Mutuo Soccorso, “Per Un Amico” and “Storia Di Un Minuto” of Premiata Forneria Marconi, “Uomo Di Pezza” of Le Orme, the homonymous debut album of Reale Accademia Di Musica, “Ys” of Il Balletto Di Bronzo, “Palepoli” of Osanna, the homonymous debut album of Quella Vecchia Locanda, “DNA” of Jumbo, and next to them, we can find a small pearl, almost unknown, “ll Paese Dei Balocchi”, the album of the band with the same name.
Il Paese Dei Balocchi was founded in Rome in 1971. Born from the ashes of Under 2000 and active since 1965, Il Paese Dei Balocchi were noticed in 1971 by the producer Adriano Fabi who proposed them the making of an album. This happened in the following year and the recording sessions lasted only two weeks and they released their only album.
“Il Paese Dei Balocchi” is a conceptual album with a very pessimistic theme about the humankind, its society and the search for convincing answers. The concept is about a journey of a man inside himself, and himself here was imagined as a “Land of Toys”, the one where we all want to live escaping from a reality that doesn’t satisfy us and where those who hold the threads of power, the despots, manoeuvres us as true “puppets”. It’s the search for the human identity, passing through the good and the evil, trying to understand who we are, why we are here and where we are going to.
The cover of the album depicts many pieces of coloured fabric sewn together. It represents the music on the album, the collage of sounds, classical and electronic, and atmospheres melancholy mismatches, presents on the album, not to be seen as compositional confusion, but as a great technical skill and ability to juggle the articulated world. Its music is a mix of classical, avant-garde and prog. Keyboards dominate, but there are some great orchestral arrangements too.
On the first track is the amalgam between guitar, organ, bass and drums that impose to it. After a short break, the song creates suspense and changes. The last seconds are relaxing. The second track carries with numerous and sudden changes. The start is minimal, with a guitar and a theme of few notes, taken after a distorted guitar. The evolution is introduced by bass and the entry is accompanied by choirs. Shortly, the organ tries to restore the calm, but it’s only appearance. The choirs and guitar come followed by a short segment of keyboards that closes it. The third track is the first sung. A slight arpeggio starts a melancholic ballad. The basic sadness is present later on strings, voice and text. The end reminds the pieces for strings of Vivaldi. The fourth track has a dreamlike psychedelic flavour, a feeling created by the guitar on the first part of the piece. From the second minute the dreamy atmosphere takes more shape with the entry of keyboards and battery. We can note some sporadic synth inserts and the fuller finish. The choirs in the end remind me Pink Floyd. The fifth track has a structure that creates an atmosphere that can be used as film music. The bass seems to be taken from Banco Del Mutuo Soccorso. The sixth track has a double soul. The first part has a lively intro that exudes something medieval. The second part is entrusted to a voice that sings with a “monastic” tone. The seventh track is a short and intense song, only played with strings. It’s close to the pieces on the three “Concerto Grosso” of New Trolls. It’s influenced by Vivaldi. The eighth track is another short song. The only participants are guitar and voice. On the ninth track is the bass, accompanied by the percussion, which gives meaning to the piece. They lead the way to a great prog segment. The organ solo presents sounds very British. The last part has psychedelic sounds. The tenth track is a test of strength of the organ alone, played by Paone. For the occasion, an organ was used in the church of Saint Euclide, a church where some choirs were recorded. It’s a piece influenced by the organ works of Bach.
Conclusion: “ll Paese Dei Balocchi” is mostly an instrumental album. It’s very symphonic and heavily influenced by the classical music of the Baroque Period, namely by the music of Vivaldi and J. S. Bach. Despite the busy beginning, the music mostly aims to be atmospheric and to create ambience instead of flashiness, with a few vocals appearing through the mist every now and then, sometimes only as a backing choir. The acoustic and electric guitars, bass and lots of Hammond organ come together to give to ambitious music worthy of the masters of the golden era of the Italian prog scene. The music is quite complex of the early 70’s and the vocals are in Italian and excellent. This is another remarkable Italian prog rock album of the 70’s, essentially for the lovers of the classical music and the symphonic prog.
Music was my first love.
John Miles (Rebel)
