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Avete mai avuto la sensazione di esservi persi nello spazio? Bene, è questo lo stato d’ animo che ha fatto nascere il quarto disco di Aimee Mann, cantautrice americana, già leader dei ‘Til Tuesday, che ha ottenuto una certa notorietà internazionale qualche anno fa grazie alla (bellissima) colonna sonora di Magnolia. Solitudine, sfiducia nel mondo e nelle relazioni interpersonali (nonché nelle case discografiche, con cui in passato la nostra ha avuto non pochi problemi), aridità sentimentale, problemi legati alla tossicodipendenza: questi i temi principali del suddetto piccolo gioiello.
Le melodie pulitissime, vagamente beatlesiane, sono supportate da arrangiamenti solidi ma tutto sommato spartani, come nel più delicato pop d’autore, e accompagnate da testi dolenti ma comunque illuminati da un’ inestinguibile speranza. “Humpty Dumpty” , cadenzata da un pianoforte, non lascia dubbi sulla presa di posizione dell’autrice (“I’ m not the girl you once put your faith in, just someone who looks like me” ). Ma se il passato è inesorabilmente “passato” , la reazione più opportuna è guardare avanti (“ So better take your keys and drive forever” ). Il valzer in sordina di “High On Sunday 52” si libra in un radioso ritornello country, ma finisce troppo presto. Coeso quasi come fosse un concept, Lost In Space ha in “Pavlov’ s Bell” l’ unico momento fuorviante, ma la foga che pervade quel refrain, per quanto lo proietti quasi in territori indie-rock, non stona con la morbida gradevolezza imperante. Le magiche “Real Bad News” (“You paint a lovely picture but reality intrudes, with a message for you, and it’ s real bad news” ) e “Invisibile Ink” sono dimesse auto-analisi generate dallo sconforto, in cui Aimee mostra una posa da eroina romantica, perennemente in conflitto col mondo. Tuttavia, la speranza che contraddistingue la sua attitudine alla vita la riporta presto ad uno stato d’ animo nobilmente fiducioso nell’avvenire (in “Today’ s The Day” ). L’ ultima canzone, It’s Not (cantato commosso, chitarra minimalista, pizzicato d’ archi) sembra però rimangiarsi tutto (“I believe it’ s you who could make it better, though it’ s not” ). Questo viaggio non poteva terminare in maniera più sconsolata, e forse l’ unica soluzione è davvero perdersi nello spazio: ma d’altronde, come dice un suo pezzo, “This Is How It Goes” , è così che vanno le cose, quando si ha il coraggio di affrontare la vita per quello che è.
Le liriche amaramente mature, la voce cristallina e limpida, i suoni puliti e tersi come un cielo primaverile, dipingono un ritratto d’ artista davvero impareggiabile, straordinariamente adulta: mi inchino dinnanzi a tanta eleganza.
Elenco tracce testi samples e video
01 Humpty Dumpty (04:03)
Verse 1:
Say you were split, you were split in fragments
And none of the pieces will talk to you
Wouldn't you want to be who had them
Well, maybe I want that too
Chorus:
So better take the keys and drive forever
Staying won't put these futures back together
All the perfect drugs and superheroes
Wouldn't be enough to bring me up to zero
Verse 2:
Baby, you're great, you've been more than patient
saying it's not a catastrophe
but I'm not the girl you once put your faith in
just someone who looks like me
Chorus:
So better take the keys and drive forever
staying won't put these futures back together
all the perfect drugs and superheroes
wouldn't be enough to bring me up to zero
Bridge:
So get out while you can
Get out while you can
baby I'm pouring quicksand
and thinking is all that I had planned
so better just go
Chorus:
Oh better take the keys and drive forever
staying won't put these futures back together
all the perfect drugs and superheroes
wouldn't be enough to bring me up to zero
All the kings horses and all the kings men
Couldn't put baby together again
All the kings horses and all the kings men
Couldn't put baby together again
02 High on Sunday 51 (03:18)
The monkey knows how you'll react
Creating want by holding back
Like some reverse pyromaniac
Let me try, baby, try
I propped my window up and then
I turned my back to lure you in
To rifle through what I might have been
Let me try, baby, try
Chorus:
Baby please--let me begin
Let me be your heroin
Hate the sinner but love the sin
Let me be your heroin
We have crossed the Rubicon
Our ship awash, our rudder gone
The rats have fled but I'm hanging on
Let me try, baby, try
(Chorus)
03 Lost in Space (03:30)
Lost in space
A bubble drifting
Into a place
Where planets shift and
The moon's erased
Its features lift in the glare
But I'm the stuff
Of happy endings
Though mostly bluff
Belief suspending
But close enough
For just pretending to care
And I'm pretending to care
When I'm not even there
Gone, but I don't know where
Well, she's the face
And I'm the double
Who keeps the pace
And clears the rubble
And, lost in space
Fills up the bubble with air
By just pretending to care
Like I'm not even there
Gone, but I don't know where
You split like a cell
And then cannot tell
The line from its parallel
So baby, beware
I'm just pretending to care
Like I'm not even there
Gone, but I don't know where
Gone, but I don't know where
Gone, but I don't know where
05 Guys Like Me (03:14)
Guys like me
We don't know how it feels
Absentee even closing the deal
But every player there's a payoff in the final reel
But never with guys like me
Cause guys like me
We look good at the gate
But you'll agree with the odds on the slate
and put your money on a bonafide heavyweight
and take it off guys like me
take it off guys like me
We pull you close but never really
looking warm but feeling chilly
you'll describe us as impassioned
when it's just a front we've fashioned
Cause guys like me
We all vow to become
clear and free of the fife and the drum
and block the circulation til we're all completely numb
let's hear it for guys like me
let's hear it for guys like me
let's hear it for guys, guys like me
06 Pavlov's Bell (04:29)
Oh Mario, sit here by the window
Stay here 'til we reach Idaho
And when we go
Hold my hand on take-off
Tell me what I already know
That we can't talk about it
No, we can't talk about it
Because nobody knows
That's how I nearly fell
Trading clothes
And ringing Pavlov's Bell
History shows
There's not a chance in hell, but
Oh Mario. we're only to Ohio
It's kinda getting harder to breathe
I won't let it show
I'm all about denial
But can't denial let me believe?
That we could talk about it
But we can't talk about it
Because nobody knows
That's how I nearly fell
Trading clothes
And ringing Pavlov's Bell
History shows but rarely shows it well
Well, well, well
Oh Mario, why if this is nothing
I'm finding it so hard to dismiss
If you're what I need,
Then only you can save me
So come on baby. give me the fix
And let's just talk about it
I've got to talk about it
Because nobody knows
That's how I nearly fell
Trading clothes
And ringing Pavlov's Bell
History shows
Like it was show and tell
So tell me
That's how I nearly fell
By ringing Pavlov's Bell
So, baby, show and tell
Oh Mario, Mario
07 Real Bad News (03:55)
You don't know, so don't say you do--
You don't
You might think that things will change,
But take my word--
They won't
You paint a lovely picture,
But reality intrudes
With a message for you
And it's real bad news
I was undecided like you
At first
But I could not stem the tide of overwhelm
And thirst
You try to keep it going, but a lot of avenues
Just aren't open to you
When you're real bad news
I've got love and anger
They come as a pair
You can take your chances
But buyer beware
And I won't
Make you feel bad
When I show you
This big ball of sad isn't
Worth even filling with air
And baby, let me tell you
You can get some things confused
Like whose secrets are whose
And that's real bad news
Real bad news
Real bad news
08 Invisible Ink (05:01)
There comes a time when you swim or sink
So I jumped in the drink
Cuz I couldn't make myself clear
Maybe I wrote in invisible ink
Oh I've tried to think
How I could have made it appear
But another illlustration is wasted
Cuz the results are the same
I feel like a ghost who's trying to move your hands
over some ouija board in the hopes I can spell out my name
What some take for magic at first glance
Is just sleight of hand depending on what you believe
Something gets lost when you translate
It's hard to keep straight
Perspective is everything
And I know now which is which and what angle I oughta look at it from
I suppose I should be happy to be misread-
Better be that than some of the other things I have become
Invisible Ink
But nobody wants to hear this tale
The plot is clichéd, the jokes are stale
And baby we've all heard it all before
Oh I could get specific but
Nobody needs a catalog
With details of love I can't sell anymore
And aside from that, this chain of reaction,
baby, is losing a link
Though I'd hope you'd know what I tried to tell you
And if you don't I could draw you a picture in invisible ink
But nobody wants to hear this tale
The plot is clichéd, the jokes are stale
And baby we've all heard it all before
Oh I could get specific but
Nobody needs a catalog
With details of love I can't sell anymore
10 The Moth (03:48)
"The moth don't care when he sees the flame
he might get burned, but he's in the game.
and once he's in he can't go back, and
beat his wings till he burns them black.
No the moth don't care when he sees the flame.
No the moth don't care when he sees the flame.
The moth don't care if the flame is real
'coz flame and moth got a sweetheart deal,
and nothing fuels a good flrtation
like need and anger and desperation.
Now the moth don't care if the flame is real.
Now the moth don't care if the flame is real.
So come on, let's go. Ready or not.
'Coz there's a flame I know, hotter than hot
and with a fuse that's so thoroughly shot, away.
The moth don't care if the flame burns low
coz moth believes in an afterglow
and flames are never doused completely,
all you really need is the love of heat.
Now the moth don't care if the flame burns low.
Now the moth don't care if the flame burns low.
So come on, let's go. Ready or not.
'Coz there's a flame I know, hotter than hot
and with a fuse that's so thoroughly shot, away"
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