Fugazi del 1984: libidine!
I Marillion sono forse i primi ad aver inventato una discografia-concept: nel primo il clown suona tristemente il violino, qui riposa nella sua stanza, in Misplaced Childhood evade dalla stanza del bambino dall’infanzia scombussolata. Il disegnatore è il grandissimo Mark Wilkinson che anche in Fugazi non delude: la gazza, il camaleonte, il bicchiere pieno di sangue, la maglietta strappata, il trenino, l’alieno dal televisore, il tacco a spillo e l’abbazia fuori dalla finestra sono tutte immagini simboliche volute dal mastodontico frontman. Perché Fish è il grande personaggio nella band, il leader indiscusso, dotato di una notevole dose di carisma, ma è anche (e soprattutto) un poeta. Le parole delle canzoni sono complesse, ricche di artifici retorici (spesso in rima, ad esempio), cariche di doppi sensi e chi mastica un po’ di la lingua straniera converrà con me che sono scritte in un inglese fuori dal comune. Oltre a ciò, Fish possiede una delle più grandi voci di questo pianeta. Nonostante sia spesso stato catalogato come pallido imitatore di Peter Gabriel, si può dire che ascoltando bene i brani in cui canta si nota una differenza piuttosto lampante.
Assassing è una delle canzoni più cattive, aggressive e ossessive mai scritte dai Marillion. Parla del difficile rapporto di due personalità che vivono nello stesso corpo, in cui la parte assassina cerca di convincere quella buona a rinnegare il bene. Un intro da paura ci porta alla chitarra un po’ funky che sfocia infine nel riff. L’intermezzo di sintetizzatore è da brividi e la voce di Fish è fenomenale. Spettacolare anche la fine, in cui Fish ruggisce con una voce da baritono: “And what do you call assassins who accuse assassins anyway, my friend?”. Questo è a mio giudizio il brano più bello dei Marillion insieme a Kayleigh e Incubus. Quest’ultima è un altro capolavoro, in cui compaiono ben cinque temi musicali diversi tutti legati fra loro: la strofa (come dimenticare il mitico UUUuAh?), l’arpeggio di chitarra, il reprise della strofa, il bel pezzo di piano, l’accelerazione e il finale. Da notare lo splendido assolo del chitarrista Steve Rothery. Ha uno stile tutto particolare perché gli assoli li studia a tavolino e risultano essere non solo molto melodici, ma anche talmente scritti bene da rimanere impressi nota per nota nella mente di chi ascolta. Rothery è mostruoso. Ma tutta la band dà il meglio di sé: scrivere un pezzo così è inconcepibile per una mente comune, bisogna avere la genialità. Una curiosità: Peter Hammill, che faceva da spalla ai Marillion durante il tour di Script of a Jester’s Tear, ha ispirato a Fish (di cui è grande amico) le parole per le canzoni Assassing e Incubus regalandogli un disco di musica islamica!!! Un bel sintetizzatore introduce Punch & Judy, che parla della paranoia di Fish verso i vincoli di una relazione e della visione di essa come un inferno in cui i partner si addossano a vicenda le colpe dei fallimenti nella loro vita, culminando con un divorzio (“Worst ever thing that ever happened to me / Oh for D.I.V.O.R.C.E., OH Judy!”).
Jigsaw parla degli intrighi di coppia e delle carte segrete che vengono tenute nascoste prima di essere giocate. Il ritornello si canta al primo ascolto e suscita emozioni nel cuore dell’ascoltatore. Jigsaw è fenomenale e anche qui le tastiere fanno il gran lavoro. Non dimentichiamo anche la parte ritmica: il basso non ha segreti per il mitico Pete Trewavas (che tra l’altro è anche un ottimo compositore) e Ian Mosley si è già integrato alla perfezione nella band. She Chameleon fu ispirata da una delle tante storie di groupie che cominciarono a frequentare la band dopo i concerti nel 1983: parla proprio di sesso fatto “on the road” (“So was it just a fuck, was it just a fuck, Just another fuck I said”). E’ un lento bellissimo, con l’organo da chiesa dal riff ‘ondeggiante’ e un assolo di moog spettacolare.
Emerald Lies parla della sofferenza di un circolo di separazioni e riconciliazioni, che in quel momento stava vivendo Fish stesso. Il basso di Trewavas fa tremare lo stereo. La title-track Fugazi tratta invece di una veduta generale del mondo, definito appunto con questo aggettivo tratto dal gergo dei soldati americani in Vietnam. Bisogna sapere infatti che durante il tour di Script for a Jester’s Tear, Fish era ossessionato da questa guerra e leggeva libri su libri sull’argomento. Da qui estrapolò la parola Fugazi, che letteralmente significa “tutto a puttane, tutto fottuto”. Quindi la visione della società non risulta molto ottimistica. Magnifico l’intro di piano, seguito da un bel passaggio di chitarra. Poi la canzone si fa più movimentata, con dei begli stacchi di basso e batteria. Fish cambia la sua voce e il sintetizzatore va a manetta. Un pezzo cupo poi ci porta alla fine meravigliosa della canzone e dell’album, al grido di “Where are the prophets, where are the visionaries, where are the poets / To brach the dawn of the sentimental mercenary”.
Ma non finisce qui: è uscita la versione rimasterizzata con il secondo CD!!! La gioia di tutti fan. Cinderella Search è un singolo spettacolare con il solito finale ossessivo alla Fish. Three Boats Down From The Candy incanta dall’inizio alla fine. Poi troviamo il mix alternativo di Assassing e quattro demo: She Chameleon, Punch & Judy, Emerald Lies e Incubus. Avrei ancora tanto da dire, ma finisco dicendo solo questo: non scaricate questo album da internet, perché ogni singolo centesimo speso per Fugazi è speso strabene. Uno dei più grandi capolavori della storia del progressive.
Elenco tracce testi e video
01 Assassing (07:02)
I am the assassin, with tongue forged from eloquence
I am the assassin, providing your nemesis
On the sacrificial altar to success, my friend
Unleash a stranger from a kiss, my friend
No incantations of remorse, my friend
Unsheathe the blade within the voice, my friend
Who decorates the scarf with the fugi knot
Who camouflaged emotion in a thousand yard stare
Who gouged the notches from the family tree
Who hypnotised the guilt in career rhythm trance
Assassing, assassing, assassing, assassing
Listen as the syllables of slaughter cut with calm precision
Patterned frosty phrases rape your ears and sow the ice incision
Adjectives of annihilation bury the point beyond redemption
Venomous verbs of ruthless candour plagiarise assassins fervour
Apocalyptic alphabet casting spell the creed of tempered diction
A friend in need is a friend that bleeds
Let bitter silence infect the wound
You were a sentimental mercenary in a free fire zone
Parading a Hollywood conscience
You were a fashionable objector with a uniform fetish
Pavlovian slaver at the cash till ring of success
A non com observer - I assassin the collector - defector
So you resigned yourself to failure, my friend
And I emerged the chilling stranger, my friend
To eradicate the problem, my friend
Unsheathe the blade within the voice
I am the assassin
I am the assassin
And what do you call assassins who accuse assassins anyway, my friend?
02 Punch & Judy (03:21)
Punch
Punch and Judy
Punch and Judy
Punch and Judy
Washing machine, pinstripe dream
Stripped the gloss from a beauty queen
Punch and Judy, Judy
Found our nest, in the Daily Express
Met the vicar in a holy vest
Punch and Judy
Punch and Judy
Brought up the children Church of E
Now I vegetate with a colour TV
Worst ever thing that ever happened to me
Oh, for D.I.V.O.R.C.E.
Oh Judy
Whatever happened to pillow fights
Whatever happened to jeans so tight, Friday nights
Whatever happened to lover's lane
Whatever happened to passion games
Sunday walks in the pouring rain
Punch
Punch
Punch and Judy
Punch and Judy
Punch and Judy
Punch
Punch
Punch and Judy
Punch and Judy
Punch and Judy
Curling tongs, mogadons, "I got a headache baby, don't take so long"
Single beds, middle age dread
Losing the war in the Waistlands spread
Who left the cap of the toothpaste tube
Who forgot to flush the loo
Leave your sweaty socks outside the door
Don't walk across my polished floor, oh Judy
Whatever happened to morning smiles
Whatever happened to wicked wiles, permissive styles
Whatever happened to twinkling eyes
Whatever happened to hard fast drives
Complements on unnatural size
Punch
Punch
Punch and Judy
Punch and Judy
Punch and Judy
Punch
Punch
Punch and Judy
Punch and Judy
Punch and Judy
Propping up a bar, family car
Sweating out a mortgage as a balding clerk
Punch and Judy, Judy
World war three, suburbanshee
Just slip her these pills and I'll be free.
No more Judy
Judy, Judy no more!
Goodbye Judy!
03 Jigsaw (06:49)
We are jigsaw pieces aligned on the perimeter edge
Interlocked through a missing piece
We are renaissance children becalmed beneath the Bridge of Sighs
Forever throwing firebrands at the stonework
We are Siamese children related by the heart
Bleeding from the surgery of initial confrontation
Holding the word scalpels on trembling lips
Stand straight, look me in the eye and say goodbye
Stand straight, we've drifted past the point of reasons why
Yesterday starts tomorrow, tomorrow starts today
And the problem always seems to be we're picking up the pieces on the ricochet
Drowning tequila sunsets, stowaways on midnight ships
Refugees of romance plead asylum from the real
Scrambling distress signals on random frequencies
Forever repatriated on guilt laden morning planes
We are pilots of passion sweating the flight on course
To another summit conference, another breakfast time divorce
Screaming out a cease fire, snow-blind in an avalanche zone
Stand straight, look me in the eye and say goodbye
Stand straight, we've drifted past the point of reasons why
Yesterday starts tomorrow, tomorrow starts today
And the problem always seems to be we're picking up the pieces on the ricochet
Are we trigger happy?
Russian roulette in the waiting room
Empty chambers embracing the end
Puzzled visions haunt the ripples of a trevi moon
Dream coins for the fountain or to cover your eyes
We reached ignition point from the sparks of pleasantries
We sensed the smoke advancing from horizons
You must have known that I was concealing an escape
Stand straight, look me in the eye and say goodbye, say goodbye
Stand straight, we've drifted past the point of reasons why
Yesterday starts tomorrow, tomorrow starts today, starts today
And the problem always seems to be we're picking up the pieces
On the ricochet, this is the ricochet.
05 She Chameleon (06:52)
Sheltering her ego on the edge of a floodlit arc
She'll contemplate seduction, she'll calculate the catch
When she moved, her presence speared me
When she spoke, her words ensnared me
Watch the lizard, watch the lizard,
Watch the lizard with the crimson veil
She crucified my heart in the depth of a satin grave
As I lay in sweating monologue I sensed the lovelight fade
Within the spiral of the cigarette
You betrayed your bedside etiquette
I saw the lizard, I saw the lizard
I touched the lizard with the crimson veil
I've seen a different doorway shut a million times before
The smiling she chameleon, the smiling vinyl whores
They know what they want, they sing your name
And glide between the sheets
I never say no, in chemical glow we'll let our bodies meet
So was it just a fuck, was it just a fuck, just another fuck I said
Loving just for laughs, carnal autograph, lying on a lizard's bed
So was it just a fuck, was it just a fuck, just another fuck I bled
Degraded and alone, raped and still forlorn
Betrayed on a lizard's bed
We chameleon, we chameleon, we chameleon
06 Incubus (08:30)
When footlights dim in reverence to prescient passion forewarned
My audience leaves the stage, floating ahead perfumed shift
Within the stammering silence, the face that launched a thousand frames
Betrayed by a porcelain tear, a stained career
You played this scene before, you played this scene before
I am the mote in your eye, I am the mote in your eye
A misplaced reaction
The darkroom unleashes imagination in pornographic images
In which you will always be the star, always be the star, untouchable
Unapproachable, constant in the darkness
Nursing an erection, a misplaced reaction
With no flower to place before this gravestone
And the walls become enticingly newspaper thin
But that would be developing the negative view
And you have to be exposed in voyeuristic colour
The public act, let you model your shame
On the mannequin catwalk, catwalk
Let the cats walk, and the cat walks
I've played this scene before, I've played this scene before
I am the mote in your eye, I am the mote in your eye
A misplaced reaction, satisfaction
You can't brush me under the carpet, you can't hide me under the stairs
The custodian of your private fears, your leading actor of yesteryear
Who as you crawled out of the alleys of obscurity
Sentenced to rejection in the morass of anonymity
You who I directed with lovers will, you who I let hypnotise the lens
You who I let bathe in the spotlights glare
You who wiped me from your memory like a greasepaint mask
Just like a greasepaint mask
But now I'm the snake in the grass, the ghost of film reels past
I'm the producer of your nightmare and the performance has just begun
It's just begun
Your perimeter of courtiers jerk like celluloid puppets
As you stutter paralysed with rabbits eyes, searing the shadows
Flooding the wings, to pluck elusive salvation from the understudy's lips
Retrieve the soliloquy, maintain the obituary
My cue line in the last act and you wait in silent solitude
Waiting for the prompt, waiting for the prompt
You've played this scene before
07 Fugazi (08:12)
Vodka intimate, an affair with isolation in a Blackheath cell
Extinguishing the fires in a private hell
Provoking the heartache to renew the licence
Of a bleeding heart poet in a fragile capsule
Propping up the crust of the glitter conscience
Wrapped in the christening shawl of a hangover
Baptised in the tears from the real
Drowning in the liquid seize on the Piccadilly line, rat race
Scuttling through the damp electric labyrinth
Caress Ophelia's hand with breathstroke ambition
An albatross in the marrytime tradition
Sheathed within the Walkman wear the halo of distortion
Aural contraceptive aborting pregnant conversation
She turned the harpoon and it pierced my heart
She hung herself around my neck
From the Time-Life-Guardians in their conscience bubbles
Safe and dry in my sea of troubles
Nine to five with suitable ties
Cast adrift as their side-show, peepshow, stereo hero
Becalm bestill, bewitch, drowning in the real
The thief of Baghdad hides in Islington now
Praying deportation for his sacred cow
A legacy of romance from a twilight world
The dowry of a relative mystery girl
A Vietnamese flower, a Dockland union
A mistress of release from a magazine's thighs
Magdalenes contracts more than favours
The feeding hands of western promise hold her by the throat
A son of a swastika of '45 parading a peroxide standard
Graffiti conjure disciples testaments of hatred
Aerosol wands whisper where the searchlights trim the barbed wire hedges
This is Brixton chess
A knight for Embankment folds his newspaper castle
A creature of habit, begs the boatman's coin
He'll fade with old soldiers in the grease stained roll call
And linger with the heartburn of Good Friday's last supper
Son watches father scan obituary columns in search of absent school friends
While his generation digests high fibre ignorance
Cowering behind curtains and the taped up painted windows
Decriminalised genocide, provided door to door Belsens
Pandora's box of holocausts gracefully cruising satellite infested heavens
Waiting, the season of the button, the penultimate migration
Radioactive perfumes, for the fashionably, for the terminally insane, insane
Do you realise? Do you realise?
Do you realise, this world is totally fugazi
Where are the prophets, where are the visionaries, where are the poets
To breach the dawn of the sentimental mercenary
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