• Voto:
Recensii "Starfish" per ammirazione nei confronti di un gruppo che stimo tanto, per l'inconfondibile voce di Kilbey e per un Album, a mio parere, veramente "straordinario"
The Church, presenti da ben venticinque anni, una valanga di dischi, tra l'altro da loro autoprodotti, ascoltati gradevolmente tanto ieri, quanto ancora oggi da tutti noi, "piccoli e grandi fans" sempre a caccia delle loro novità, e "quasi sempre" ripagati con moderata soddisfazione, un esempio? ........ "El Momento Descuidado", piacevole e accessibile.
L'impatto "simpaticamente sconvolgente", è inevitabile per chi li conosce dalle origini, ma via via che lo si ascolta e riascolta, il tutto va scemando, fino ad arrivare a desiderarlo intensamente. Hanno riportato alla luce nove delle loro canzoni hit più famose, tutte riproposte in chiave interamente acustica, completamente rivestite a festa, spontanee, calme, pacate, rilassanti, con arrangiamenti calibrati, sempre da urlo gli arpeggi tra Koppes e Willson-Piper, una forte accentuazione d'archi, tastiere, organi, fisarmoniche a bocca e mandolini (tutti strumenti caratteristici e fondamentali per i The Church) armonie adatte al XXI secolo, che accompagnano quel dolce strascico di nostalgici ricordi, che piacevolmente ci fanno ancora sorridere, in altre parole sto parlando di "The Unguarded Moment", "Almost With You", "Metropolis", "Chromium", "Sealine", "A New Season", "Tristesse", "Under The Milky Way" e "Invisibile", estrapolati da "Starfish", "The Blurred Crusade", "After Everything Now This", "Heyday", etc. etc... e ci hanno deliziato d'altri cinque inediti, ovvero: "0408", "November", "All I Know", "Till The Cows Come Home", "Between Mirages".
Un Album che fa l'eccezione? E' difficile a dirsi per un gruppo fuori dagli schemi, che ha costantemente viaggiato controcorrente agli anni '80, con risultati imprevedibili, ben attento ai particolari e dalla classe innata. Questa "eccezione" può sicuramente trasformarsi, anche in critica da parte di tanti ammiratori, poco propensi nel gradire questa loro ( ), oppure può privilegiarsi di commenti benevoli alla novità, quindi libero campo ai gusti, giudizi e pregiudizi altrui, ma credetemi ascoltare un attuale "Under The Milky Way" sui passi dell'originale in "Starfish" non vi deluderà, le trovo entrambe così coinvolgenti.
Un sound molto levigato che "non rispetta" le versioni originali, ma è una dimostrazione del continuo evolversi di questo gruppo, che non ne storpia l'essenza.
Potrei concludere affermando che il tempo non li ha scalfiti, ma li ha semplicemente maturati, ed è detto tutto!
Elenco tracce e testi
01 The Unguarded Moment (03:35)
So hard finding inspiration
I knew you'd find me crying
Tell those girls with rifles for minds
That their jokes don't make me laugh
They only make me feel like dying
In an unguarded moment
So long, long between mirages
I knew you'd find me drinking
Tell those men with horses for hearts
That their jibes don't make me bleed
They only make me feel like shrinking
In an unguarded moment
So deep, deep without a meaning
I knew you'd find me leaving
Tell those friends with cameras for eyes
That their hands don't make me hang
They only make me feel like breathing
In an unguarded moment
03 Almost With You (04:28)
See the chains which bind the men
Can you taste their lonely arrogance
It's always too late
And your face is so cold
They struggled for this opulence
See the suns which blind the men
Burnt away so long before our time
Now their warmth is forgotten and gone
Pretty maids not far behind
Who you trying to get in touch with
I'm almost with you
I can sense it wait for me
I'm almost with you
Is this the taste of victory
I'm almost with you
See the dust which fills your sleep
Does it always feel this chill near the end
I never dreamed we'd meet here once more
This laugh reserved for a friend
05 Metropolis (03:21)
There'll never be another quite like you
I'm so involved with everything you do
Don't say nothing good will ever come of this
Don't say the damage is worse than it is
Back in Metropolis, circuses and elephants
Where the oranges grew
Back in Metropolis nothing can ever topple us
When I'm standing with you
You stare down at some crowd from your trapeze
And when you fell they fell down on their knees
And when you broke they scrambled for a piece
And when you spoke I felt their anger freeze
Back in Metropolis, circuses and elephants
Where the oranges grew
Back in Metropolis nothing can ever topple us
When I'm standing with you
Back in Metropolis talk about a holocaust
And then visit the zoo
Back in Metropolis the weather is ridiculous
What's it all leading to
And it's only a day away
We could leave tonight
You could sleep along the way
Dream in black and white
06 Chromium (03:43)
Silver needles
Golden eagles
Frightened faces
Basket cases
Jags and riches
Queens and witches
Electric mantras
And tight-fitting dreams
Never been so high
Never been so low
Never been so high
Gilded flowers
Long-lost hours
Morning programs
With fake suntans
Neo-maniac in the cul-de-sac
Otherwise it's this ennui
Chromium platin'
All this waiting brings me down
Suffocatin'
All those colors bring me around
Broken records
Faded labels
Songs to sing to
When you were young
A tattooed pierced arm
Fresh and perfumed
Switch your prison
Fly away
And jewels on your fingers
Tears in your dresses
Fabulous mansions
And damp little rooms
This one intrigued me
This one will grow
Purity sleeping
Reality looms
07 Sealine (02:38)
The minute the sting penetrates your finger
You're strapped to the pain like an angry stranger
The moment the rain freezes in the gutter
Caught the flaming birds and their hideous matter
The second the claw lifts up your chin
I'm alone in your head and you can't get in
Somebody said that it's all for you
It's a miracle, let it alter you
But I will not follow you to the sealine
Somebody went and turned it on for you
Revelation baby, you're beautiful
But I will not follow you to the sealine
The instant the transfer hits your account
And it's deep in the black, and just one way out
The morning the storm rolled to the coast
We were down to the shake, and our silent throats
The evening the trees lash at the window
The roots crawl up, strangle the candles
Somebody said that it's all for you
It's a miracle, let it alter you
But I will not follow you to the sealine
Somebody went and turned it on for you
Revelation baby, you're beautiful
But I will not follow you to the sealine
(To the sealine)
It's a miracle, let it alter you
Revelation baby, you're beautiful
To the sealine
11 Tristesse (04:06)
Here in this desert, beneath the sun and stars
Still troubled by the rumblings of a million distant cars
Please be good to me tonight, let me find my way
The air has some command in it I cannot disobey
A gunfight in Dodge City, a murder in Bombay
All these deeds and worldly needs I must shrug off today
All my life spent searching for prowess
Left me lying here with you, tristesse
I was working in an orchard that grew the strangest fruit
It wasn't Mother Nature that made those trees take root
Your children cannot hear you, they only want your loot
You hold on to their essence like a parachute
They never believed you were in distress
Now you've gone and left them with tristesse
Oh, waters inflamed
Ah, fires burning out
Ah, ice melting down
Ah, fires burnt out
A hotel suite in a rich man's town, a hut in Botany Bay
A prisoner by my own device, a mountain in my way
I'm gonna have to alter my address
"Cause I can't stay much longer with tristesse
And they call this carnival progress
Invited by our queen tonight, tristesse
12 Under the Milky Way (04:51)
Sometimes when this place gets kind of empty
Sound of their breath fades with the light
I think about the loveless fascination
Under the Milky Way tonight
Lower the curtain down in Memphis
Lower the curtain down all right
I got no time for private consultation
Under the Milky Way tonight
Wish I knew what you were looking for
Might have known what you would find
Wish I knew what you were looking for
Might have known what you would find
And it's something quite peculiar
Something that's shimmering and white
Leads you here despite your destination
Under the Milky Way tonight
(Chorus)
Under the Milky Way tonight
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