CSI

For months, a feverish anticipation had been building around August 28th, the opening date of the new tour by CSI. Adored by their audience throughout the Nineties, they hadn't performed all together since the summer of 1998: a band of such strong, disparate personalities, who for five years made the history of Italian alternative music, before the split hit with implacable force starting at the end of '99, leaving fans speechless. Since then, 28 years have passed, and that's a long time: the members of the Consorzio Suonatori Indipendenti have gone their separate ways in the meantime, becoming accomplished musicians, producers and writers, occasionally collaborating with one another but always and only in partial line-ups. Giovanni Lindo Ferretti recently and affectionately described CSI as "a rabble of personalities that somehow works": picturing them together again as "Geniali dilettanti in selvaggia parata" ("brilliant amateurs in a wild parade"), to quote the lyrics of "Linea gotica", can only stir emotion once again.

Anyone hoping to see them again in 2026 within the usual conventions of today's shows, perhaps on some mega-stage with giant screens, will be disappointed. The In viaggio tour passes through places charged with deep symbolic meaning, not exactly designed for big concerts. This is especially true of the opening night on August 28th, repeated on August 29th, in the Bolognese Apennines, in Marzabotto, at the Monte Sole Historical Park. It's a place of extraordinary natural beauty, yet one where history still cries out: here, in 1944, the Nazi-fascists systematically killed more than 775 civilians in reprisal. Visiting the Marzabotto memorial and reading the names of the victims — mostly children, women and the elderly — leaves you overwhelmed with grief.
This location was specifically chosen by CSI for their tour and, as we'll see, carries a precise meaning within the concert itself, though it also brings a whole series of minor and major problems worth pointing out. The Montesole stage is a fixed wooden structure, backed by the woods; it's highly original — so much so that Guido Harari used it as the backdrop for the band's promotional image — but it's small and tucked away, suited to concerts on a limited scale with an audience presumably seated. In front of the stage, the hillside forms a kind of natural amphitheater: essentially, only those standing up high, quite high up, get a good view, since the slope doesn't compensate for how sunken the stage is. Down below, only the fenced-off crowd and perhaps those in the second row have decent visibility of the show; for everyone else, you have to leave it to the imagination... Another problem: you can't "mosh" on a slope! Anyone standing at the front gets crushed. Someone should gently explain that to whoever was shoving their way forward from the very first song of the show.
Finally, the characteristics of the venue didn't help the sound balance, which in the front rows, at least for the first few songs, wasn't up to par. This affected especially Massimo Zamboni's guitar, Ginevra Di Marco's voice and Gianni Maroccolo's bass, which weren't amplified to the same level as the other instruments. As the concert went on and as you moved up toward the hill, the situation improved markedly.

Once you understood that this wasn't an institutional show, but rather something closer to a happening — as Francesco Magnelli called it — and that the Monte Sole park, lit by a full moon among other things, was an integral part of the performance, everything changed for the better.
What's striking is the audience's love for CSI: there are plenty of people in their 50s, 60s and 70s, but also young couples with children in tow, and teenagers. Some watched the band come into being, others know them through their parents and siblings; some discovered them recently, others follow them as a natural consequence of loving CCCP: it's heartening to see that almost everyone knows every song by heart. While waiting for the show, some read, some sleep, some chat. The mood is indeed that of a festive happening; then, around 9:15pm, when people have already gotten to their feet and impatience starts to build, Gianni Maroccolo walks onto the stage... And you can't help thinking: "Now he's going to do what Guccini used to do, tell everyone to sit down or the show won't start." But clearly, this isn't a Guccini concert. Nor is it a repeat of the "In quiete" live show, where CSI played in a circle in an unplugged format with the audience seated. Maroccolo announces: "There are another 400 people still in line to get in, please be patient, because we won't start until everyone's inside." This is met with applause in solidarity, as well as its fair share of grumbling. After all, at least five thousand people made their way to Monte Sole by car, shuttle, and even on foot: even though the venue was well signposted and parking had been arranged well in advance, there were simply a huge number of vehicles on the road, causing inevitable slowdowns, and cars' clutches were put through their paces on the steeper stretches. For CSI, though, this and more!

And yet, the spirit of Guccini and his beloved Apennines somehow makes itself felt: CSI prepare to take the stage with the intro of "Noi non ci saremo", in their stark, apocalyptic version, apocalyptic being the tone of almost every theme in the show. The audience is warm and goes wild with joy for "In viaggio", which opens the set in the electric arrangement found on "Ko de mondo".
The band members, at least on this first date, interact with each other very little, partly because the stage is built in such a way that each of them ends up positioned, willingly or not, in a kind of niche, hidden behind poles. From many vantage points, anyone who can see Giorgio Canali and Gianni Maroccolo can't see Massimo Zamboni on the opposite side: visibility is undeniably limited. And perhaps it really does make sense to change your vantage point several times during the show in order to catch and appreciate different points of view.

With "A tratti" the band seems to find its perfect balance, the rhythm of the toms hits you in the gut, and there's something liberating about standing amid the crowd on the hillside, singing at the top of your lungs: “Non fare di me un idolo mi brucerò/ Se divento un megafono m’incepperò/ Cosa fare non fare non lo so/ Quando dove perché riguarda solo me/ Io so solo che tutto va ma non va/ Non va, non va, non va, non va”. And the mind drifts too to the film "Tutti giù per terra", when Valerio Mastandrea, during the funeral of his beloved aunt, releases the handbrake of the hearse and lets it roll freely downhill, chased by his stunned relatives. It's no coincidence that we'll soon be hearing about Valerio Mastandrea and Davide Ferrario again, in connection with Ferretti and Zamboni's journey to Mongolia...

The most moving moments of the evening are, without doubt, those tied to the theme of war. After all, in Marzabotto, all of us taking part in this musical ritual are standing on the "Gothic Line". In the song that gives its title to the 1996 masterpiece, Ferretti deliberately keeps his voice hoarse as he declaims: “E scegliersi la parte dietro la linea gotica/ Comandante diavolo, monaco obbediente/ Giovane staffetta, ribelle combattente/ La mia piccola patria dietro la linea gotica/ Sa scegliersi la parte”. Just as it's painful to hear "Cupe vampe" thirty years later and realize that nothing has changed: “Ci fotte la guerra che armi non ha/ Ci fotte la pace che ammazza qua e là/ Ci fottono i preti, i pope, i mullah/ L’Onu, la Nato, la civiltà”.
The setlist, put together by Gianni Maroccolo, also includes the song "Montesole", which isn't technically a CSI song but a PGR one, yet it sounds perfect given where we are: performed as a duet by Ferretti and Ginevra Di Marco, it proves to be a song of peace of extraordinary gentleness. The performances of "Esco" and "Ongii" are also thrilling, with Zamboni's electric guitar riffs truly striking a chord in the soul, as does the cover of Franco Battiato's "E ti vengo a cercare", which here, between the moon and the mountains, sounds more intense than ever.

But what really stands out for sheer sonic power and the ability to draw in the crowd are two other songs in particular: "Unità di produzione" and "Form and substance", merciless, despairing critiques of the alienation bred by totalitarian regimes but also by consumer society. Both songs build an excellent, genuine wall of sound, with Maroccolo's crushingly heavy bass seeming to rise up from the very bowels of the Apennines, and Magnelli's hypnotic keyboards casting a spell over the audience.
Even the closing number, "Buon anno ragazzi", is raw and disenchanted: the musicians, just as they used to do many years ago, leave the stage repeating the phrase "Nessuna garanzia per nessuno" ("No guarantees for anyone") over and over, with no frills and no celebration. And yet here, giving in to nostalgia for the "In quiete" live show, it would have been lovely to hear Ferretti introduce the band: Zamboni's melodic guitar, Canali's "disturbed guitar that disturbs", Magnelli's piano, bandleader Gianni Maroccolo, Ginevra's female voice and, on this occasion, Simone Filippi's drums.

We leave Marzabotto with a small wish/regret: we'd love to catch other shows on this tour, to fully grasp the beauty of these brilliant amateurs in a wild parade, in relation to the character of whichever place is chosen for each individual show. We're sure there will be no shortage of further surprises.

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