Elvengamello

I had a certain fear when I knew that this album was composed of spoken words, but I was relieved completely to note that these last were musically accompanied. And of a great manner! Militia has been an active Italian band for a very long time in the underground and new - wave scene of the peninsula and this album constitutes in a way their return after a long absence. Each text is read by a different person, using either Italian, French, German or English, each being sustained by a very precise music. This project is born of the interest carried by the members of Militia to History and culture of the region of Umbria in Italy. They looked therefore for people who, by their personal experiences, were able to understand and to express at their best their emotions facing the topic, intellectual people for most of them, who by their work or their life in general, are brought to frequent the region of Umbria. this is how express themselves narrators found in the region, or others artists from other regions or countries, having in common a strong interest for this region and being on the same length of wave as the members of the group. There are for example Philippe Leroy, Salvatore Sciarriono, Marc Dara Woods, Vittorio Gorini or Walter Saxer. The result is more that convincing. Some tracks are ambient, experimental, or a lot more dub, like Scorn, or with very melodic pieces with mad percussions and violins. Guitars and bass mingle with the experimental electronic samplings, or mix in a dark pop tinted of 80's influences. The advantage of narrator's change in each track represents evidently an absence of monotony. Elvengamello " is an excellent surprise in which music has an importance as big as the texts themselves. A excellent concept album to discover a beautiful region.

Stéphane Fivaz
July 2000

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