I have no exact date on when this trio consisting of Matteo Mancini (vocals & guitar), Giulio Catarinelli (bass) and Lukas Tiberio Klopfenstein (drums) started this Perugia based band (oh darn…I forgot to check that town’s positioning within Italy), but the band’s MySpacepage was started in May 2007…so that’s a good estimate, I guess!
The trio has been participating in several important band contests and national festivals since 2008, and has shared a stage at some time with the likes of Il Teatro Degli Orrori, I Ministri, Calibro 35, Dubsync, Olly & The Fire, The Hacienda, The Greenhouse Effect, 99 Posse, Amour Fou, and the American Eagle And Talon. I also happen to know there’s another release, also issued by Rokkaforte Records (in essence a recording studio which started its own label, with now about 10 releases to its name), but have no further details on it. I’m guessing this second release by the band was recorded/ mixed/ mastered somewhere late last year, and released in early 2011.
Style-wize, the band has been compared to country fellows I Ministri and 99 Posse, but perhaps you’ll understand better when I tell you Spasmodicamente comes from the same corner as such luminaries as Melvins, Mike Patton (in all his “solo” band incarnations). In other words, what you get here is a mixture of Ambient Rock with changing intensities and frequent Jazz-influences. That the trio is incredibly tuned-in to each other is clear from the fact that they guys used their instruments in sometimes minimalist guitar/ bass settings (meaning, the guitarist may drop out completely to have the bassist put his sounds up front) on top of a real nice drum/ percussion background…which, in fact, is the solid foundation on which all the rest stands strongly…or delicately, depending on the temporary mood of the songs (because what starts as a calmer track may have furious passages, and vice versa). That the instruments can stand their own without the vocals, is proven on this EP by the instrumentals “Coda” and “Viel Lärm un Nichts” (the first less than 2 minutes long, but together with the ensuing other one, you get a near 6-minute instrumental interval on the 18-minute EP). At (www.) myspace.com/spasmodicamente, you can find the complete EP (with mixed-up track-listing) posted, as well as 3 live videos (two of which songs from the new EP). In the “ascolta” section of the label’s website (www.) rokkaforte.com, you’ll find pre-production samples of some of those songs, as well as samples of 3 songs from the band’s previous outing.
If the comparisons were of your liking, you’re most definitely an open-minded music listener, and you won’t mind this band’s vocals being done in their native language (lyrics are provided in the booklet, by the way), I’m sure. So, check this out now! To me personally, this was one of the top bands (if not THE top band) in the whole lot of (was it 28?) albums sent to us by the agency! So, don’t let the top rating of this EP slap you in the face by surprise, okay? Darn, I love this (and in the background a soft voice whispers “And yet another band gets its album set aside in the year-lists…)!
98/100
Tony.
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