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Billy Bragg - "Don't Try This At Home" e… …"He owes it all to Spandau Ballet"
Billy Bragg, una vita frenetica e combattiva con impegni politici che danno una solida struttura alle sue opere musicali. Un artista, un uomo, che coniuga canzoni folk pop, folk rock, folk song con vere proteste legate ai diritti civili, conflitti sociali e individuali che descrive nei suoi testi con rispetto, tanta leggerezza, amore e molto sentimento.
Le sue opere sono come delle sculture dalle forme vive alleggerite dall'alternarsi tra melodia e canto, sono profonde suggestioni immortalate in fusioni orchestrali dove sono i testi che descrivono i comportamenti vitali dell'essere umano e che danno vita al suo stile personale. Questo stile ha un sapore primitivo, incisioni primordiali, motivi arcaici, linguaggi universali che sono la sintesi di tutto. La compiutezza formale quasi ostentata, inadatta al fermento dell'epoca contemporanea che oramai naviga nei suoi dolori giornalieri, sfociando sempre di più in quella evidente imperfezione umana che crea tarli in grado di logorare quella "dura scorza" nel tentativo di dare un valore alla vita.
Bragg cerca qualcosa di concreto e fondamentale in cui credere, qualcosa che è radicato dentro di se da sempre. Il movimento combattivo degli ideali che regolano lo spirito per dimostrare che un uomo, nonché artista di se stesso, non può chiudersi in una torre d'avorio, anzi deve essere coinvolto e proiettato nella società, deve mettere in evidenza l'interessante ricerca dell'espressione con la prassi della fantasia e dell'inventività comportamentale.
Le sue melodie sono tutto l'emblematico fulgore di superfici squarciate da una prorompente energia interna, di pulsioni incontenibili di una vita tumultuosa, dove abbaglianti levigatezze diventano meteore che colpiscono i cuori e le menti. Le mani tormentano gli strumenti che infrangono l'involucro delle idee per capire il mistero della vita, misurazione con la realtà intima delle cose, senza finzioni. Il meccanismo che regola il movimento, la vitalità e il potere di scoprire gli arcani della vita. Così il simbolo diventa fondamentale nell'opera di Bragg.
"Moving The Goalposts" le note creano la melodia che lascia spazio alla curiosità d'investigare, "You Woke Up My Neighbourhood" superba melodia proiettata a livelli di alta maturità, "Mother Of The Bride" inno poetico sempre con la base di testo impegnativo e reale, "Tank Park Salute" energia vitale che preme dall'anima per esplodere in forme maestose "Accident Waiting To Happen" per chi non riesce più ad avere un briciolo di "dignità e bellezza per se stesso" o "Rumours Of War" la dolorosa voce che viene sovrastata da un struggente violoncello pizzicato da un pianoforte, "The Few" Bragg, un vero gentleman polemico e contestatore, "North Sea Bubble" leggiadra e inconfondibile.
La ristampa dell'Album originale è accompagnato da un secondo bonus cd con quattordici tracce extra tra demo, alternative versioni, mix e versioni che lo rendono ancora più interessante nell'instancabile ascolto.
Anche se per tanti non è un grande capolavoro, per altri, compresa la sottoscritta, invece lo è grazie alla delicatezza e all'impegno. Se non si possiede né l'Album originale né questa doppia versione di straordinaria bellezza, allora indubbiamente è da acchiappare al volo!
Ricordate di metterla nella Vostra "lista della spesa".
Elenco tracce testi e video
02 Moving the Goalposts (02:34)
I put on my raincoat to make it rain
And sure enough the skies opened up again
I dreamed of you as I walked to the shops
You were dancing with the wallies on Top Of The Pops
Once in a while
Gennady Gerasimov drops his smile
And you can see that his aim's
A portfolio pregnant with gains
He's been up all night
Moving the goalposts
Like a jackdaw with a fiery brand
Spread the news all over this land
Robin Hood and his Merry Men
Are never, never, never coming back again
I don't believe that love should be pain
So could you please rub my back again
I think it's safe to leave tham in the park
Let's blow out the candles and kiss in the dark
Heavens above
Can this sticky stuff really be love!
Don't get dressed yet
Not yet
We've been up all night
Moving the goalposts
03 Everywhere (04:58)
Dig in boys for an extended stay
Those were final orders to come down that day
Waiting to be saved in the Philippines
You'll wait forever for the young Marines
Now I believe to be here is right
But I have to say that I'm scared tonight
Crouching in this hole with a mouth full of sand
What comes first the country or the man?
Look at those slanted eyes coming up over the hill
Catching us by surprise, it's time to kill or to be killed
Over here, over there, it's the same everywhere
A boy cries out for his mama before he dies for his home
All my life I wanted to be
As clever and strong as my best friend Lee
We grew up together along Half Moon Bay
Lee was Japanese, born in the USA
When Tommy was fighting Jerry along the River Seine
Me and Lee wanted to do the same
Then they bombed Pearl Harbour at the break of day
I was headed for these islands while Lee was hauled away
They said look at his slanted eyes, he's guilty as guilty can be
Sent here as enemy spies to sabatage the Land of the Free
I never got home, my platoon was never saved
That little fox hole became my island grave
Lee got out of jail but a prisoner he remained
Till he ended his own life to lose that ball and chain
And they said Oh Little Slanted Eyes can't you forgive and forget?
And he said, Oh Mr Friendly Ghost
Can you catch water in a net?
05 You Woke Up My Neighbourhood (03:11)
As I wait for sleep to drag me under
In the evening gloom I sit and wonder
The words I should have said to you
The things I always meant to do
The bad dreams that all came true
Chorus:
You woke up my neighbourhood
Night after night we would row
You woke up my neighbourhood
Things are pretty quiet round here now
When I think of how we were together
I know we couldn't be like that for ever
Beneath the Seven Sister stars
The night we let it go too far
I slept out in the car
Chorus
I remember skipping on the porch tilll it grew cold
I remember feeling like I was eight years old
Somersaults across the lawn
Singing dancing up till dawn
Every now and then we'd have a row
You woke up my neighbourhood
Things are pretty quiet round here now
Chorus (repeat)
08 The Few (03:27)
At night the Baby Brotherhood and the Inter City Crew
Fill their pockets up with calling cards
And paint their faces red white and blue
Then they go out seeking different coloured faces
And anyone else that they can scare
And they salute the foes their fathers fought
By raising their right hands in the air.
Oh look how my country's patriots are hunting down below
What do they know of England who only England know?
From the stands of the Empire Stadium
Come the heralds of the New Dark Age
With the simplicities of bigotry
And to whom all the world's a stage
These little John Bullshits know that the press
Will glorify their feats
So that the general public fear them
And the authorities say give 'em all seats
And the wasted seed of the bulldog breed
Is shouting "Here we go!"
What do they know of England who only England know?
Our neighbours shake their heads
And take their valuables inside
While my countrymen piss in their fountains
To express our national pride
And to prove to the world that England
Is just as rotten as she looks
They repeat the lies that caught their eyes
At school in history books
But the wars they think they're fighting
Were all over long ago
What do they know of England who only England know?
And the society that spawned them
Just cries out "Who's to blame?"
And then wraps itself in the Union Jack
And just carries on the same
Oh look out, my country's patriots are hunting down below
What do they know of England who only England know?
09 Sexuality (03:47)
Sexuality
I've had relations with girls from many nations
I've made passes at women of all classes
And just because you're gay I won't turn you away
If you stick around I'm sure that we can find some common ground
Chorus:
Sexuality - Strong and warm and wild and free
Sexuality - Your laws do not apply to me
A nuclear submarine sinks off the coast of Sweden
Headlines give me headaches when I read them
I had an uncle who once played for Red Star Belgrade
He said some things are really best left unspoken
But I prefer it all to be out in the open
Sexuality - Strong and warm and wild and free
Sexuality - Your laws do not apply to me
Sexuality - Don't threaten me with misery
Sexuality - I demand equality
I'm sure that everybody knows how much my body hates me
It lets me down most every time and makes me rash and hasty
I feel a total jerk before your naked body of work
I'm getting weighed down with all this information
Safe sex doesn't mean no sex it just means use your imagination
Stop playing with yourselves in hard currency hotels
I look like Robert De Niro, I drive a Mitsubishi Zero
Sexuality - Strong and warm and wild and free
Sexuality - Your laws do not apply to me
Sexuality - Come eat and drink and sleep with me
Sexuality - We can be what we want to be
12 Dolphins (04:20)
Sometimes I think about
Saturday's child
And all about the time
We were running wild
I've been searching
For the dolphins in the sea
And sometimes I wonder
Do you ever think of me
This world may never change
The way it's been
And all the ways of war
Won't change it back again
I'm not the one to tell
This world how to get along
I only know that peace will come
When all our hate is gone
This world may never change
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