Satantango - Sounds for a Landscape of the Soul

There's a plain that isn't just a place, but a state of mind: made of fog, empty warehouses and memories that weigh more than the present. It's from here that the duo's imagery takes shape, suspended between the black and white of austere cinema and a rough songwriting style, imperfect by choice. The name comes from a cinephile epiphany, but soon becomes a poetic statement: telling the story of the provinces as a metaphor for a broader decline, both cultural and human. In this interview, with references ranging from Béla Tarr to Michelangelo Antonioni, by way of a lively, layered musical culture, a portrait emerges of a generation that observes, without illusions, what remains. And tells it with originality.

I'd say let's start right with the name Satantango, and with the fact that both the novel and the film tell of a world that is dying, a profound crisis, one of identity too. Why did you choose this name, and why tell the story of the provinces as a metaphor?

We chose it the first time we watched the film, because we recognised our own places in it. The opening scene with the farmhouse, which lasts ten minutes, is identical to one near where we live. So the setting is definitely very close to the one we grew up in. In general, even the black and white feels like a foggy day, with mud, puddles, that almost powdery haze on the horizon. And then these places are also a metaphor for what we wanted to say: a society we've watched slowly die, a culture that's dying, a kind of socio-cultural decay. It felt like a very coherent choice, both in terms of imagery and sound.

Yours is a refined, unvarnished kind of cinema, Mubi-programming material, so to speak. Do you see yourselves in that?

Absolutely! We love Hungarian cinema, Polish, Russian, Antonioni. Then Truffaut, Godard. In “Cinema Tognazzi” there's also a reference to “Appuntamento a Belleville”. “Gioventù, amore e rabbia” is an important reference: it talks a lot about self-sabotage, which is something very much our own, generational thing.

Generational, but also universal.

Yes, also because today the world is so connected that the differences have narrowed. But the gap with those born already holding a phone connected to the internet is still very noticeable. We were the last children without the web.

Listening to the album, incidentally, in some ways I got the feeling of a long-distance dialogue with certain moods from the latest Post Nebbia. You're different, but you seem to have grown up together...

We're also linked by the same record label, and probably by some shared themes. Our province and theirs are different: we're in the Bassa Cremonese, they're in the Veneto. But the great plain, the Padania that stretches from the Veneto all the way to Piedmont, is fairly similar everywhere. There's a certain kind of sadness, of melancholy, of looking back at the past. You always hear people say everything used to be better. We grew up being told that things used to be cooler, even growing up in wartime. But our childhood, lived through the Nineties, was a happy one.

Has the provinces changed for the better since then?

Not really, in our area. Just go around and look at the fields, the abandoned factories, the disused warehouses, places we remember as active, alive. The cinema we used to go to as kids is closed, a lot of things just aren't there anymore. We also see them uprooting the trees, taking something away from us. It's a feeling most millennials probably share, but in certain areas you live it more, you can really touch it with your hands.

It's striking to hear people so young say that something has already been taken away from them. That comes through in your lyrics too: a sense of deprivation, of life pulling back.

Yes, that's true. Also because the lyrics come from our own experience, from our generation. Even with our friends, it often happens that we say: "Remember that thing? It's not there anymore." It feels strange, because those are usually conversations that come later in life. The two of us live in the same tiny village, we've known each other since we were little. It's inevitable that our world ends up in the songs.

How do you relate to the aggressiveness and the closed-mindedness of the provinces?

We live a duality: shutting ourselves indoors while at the same time seeking escape in open spaces. In the end, though, you always go back home. We're very attached to our territory. We don't offer judgments or solutions: we observe, we live in the middle of it, we survive it.

What's your songwriting method?

It depends. Some songs are started by one of us and finished by the other, or vice versa. Some come out in one go, others are the result of a longer gestation. It's controlled chaos: when an idea comes up, we try to steer it. Sometimes we start from the lyrics, sometimes from the music, sometimes from an image. Sometimes the lyrics and the vocal line come together, other times the vocal line comes first and the lyrics follow. There's no real method: we see where an idea takes us, and we follow it.

All done with a 2009 Mac, an audio interface and a bit of luck.

Yeah, half broken-down. We made a virtue of necessity, but we also wanted it to be a dirty, muddy record. It felt natural to use what we had. If a take was too clean, we'd redo it to make it dirtier on purpose. We always went with whatever moved us most, even if it was imperfect.

There's also a return to rock as a language for saying something bigger. Are there any experiences you feel close to?

Fontaines D.C. for sure. Then Le luci della centrale elettrica was an important reference in terms of imagery. Also Big Thief, for the way they talk about their homeland and their social class. And sonically, those dirty, almost paper-like sounds.

What's it like bringing a two-person project to the stage?

In rehearsals for the live show we were very strict about the parts. We play as a four-piece, with drums and bass. We try to stay faithful to the record while keeping the sonic impact. Everything is built on a precise balance: if you change something, the track often stops working. We play the whole record. And then everyone goes home.

But the record does contain the seed of improvisation.

The outro is the only point where we stretch things out a bit live. It's the only thing that really changes.

Your harmonic writing is also very distinctive and functional to the sound.

We really love open chords. We tried to avoid the more "campfire" ones, like E major. We prefer sevenths, ninths. We almost always avoided E minor and A minor. On this record we dropped in traces of different influences. Everything was thought through a great deal, even though the execution stayed dirty. There's a desire to play something a little rotten.

So rehearsal room, mold included, vintage computer. This also sounds like a set...

Yeah, that computer is a bit of a holy relic. We wonder how it managed to handle tracks with 60-70 tracks. We don't know how, but it held up. And we're attached to those old plug-ins too.

As for musical references, I picked up on a strong shoegaze attitude, which brings me back to Sundays, Cocteau Twins. There's also a Mellotron on one of the instrumentals.

Yes. Anything dream pop and shoegaze. We're very attached to Cocteau Twins, Slowdive, My Bloody Valentine. There's a lot of that imagery in "Permafrost". The Nineties influence is huge. And there's also a bit of the Seventies, something slightly prog. The Mellotron is an instrument we adore.

Blended with the choral parts, it creates a very dreamlike atmosphere, which also chimes with the scighera of the Cremona countryside.

Yes. Lyrically we're very realistic, we talk about real things, but combining that with a dreamlike, hazy, ethereal atmosphere is something we really like. It lets us build a bubble: the idea is that the listener enters the bubble with the first song and comes out of it with the last.

The album opens with "11 settembre". Why start right there?

It represents the beginning of the fall, both cultural and economic. Maybe the Nineties lasted until September 11th: the enthusiasm for the new millennium, for the future. That was the peak, and then it became clear things wouldn't go that way. From that point on, the perception of security changed. We're still feeling the consequences today: it was a watershed date.

And what does "Permafrost" tell instead?

It's about the inability to communicate. People get close to each other, but there's always a block that keeps them from truly reaching one another. It's a theme that runs through the whole record.

Your music celebrates a twilight. Is it more self-indulgent or more cathartic?

We don't offer solutions. We just take note of things. It's a calm resignation, somewhat existentialist. We wallow in it a little. We live in a landscape that pushes you toward nostalgia. It's a matter of territory, of people, of being from Cremona.

A state of mind?

Exactly.

(April 26, 2026)

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