Last night a Mixtape saved my life

The rich central Italian section takes us from the poignant Genoa masterfully painted by Paolo Conte ("Genova per noi") to the contradictory Milan of "sugar and tar" depicted by Lucio Dalla, from the Turin of Subsonica ("Il cielo su Torino") to the "Firenze (Canzone triste)" of Ivan Graziani, from the irresistible Emilian fresco of Francesco Guccini's "Bologna" to the memorable portraits of Naples and Rome courtesy of three of their true-blue bards (Pino Daniele, Gabriella Ferri and Antonello Venditti), while Litfiba's Piero Pelù proves more exotic with the sinister, Middle-Eastern-flavored "Istanbul".

And if the Feelies from Haledon, New Jersey, light up the nights of Moscow (“Moscow Nights”), six songs take on the task of chronicling America's megacities (and beyond): from the New York of Laura Nyro (“New York Tendaberry”) and Interpol (“NYC”) to the “Sweet Home Chicago” of bluesman Robert Johnson and the pacifist San Francisco of Scott McKenzie, all the way to the birthplace of the Messiah of rock, that “Tupelo” which only Nick Cave could render so dark and unsettling, and to a no less restless California: that of X in “Los Angeles“.

But the journey continues into Brazil too, with the “São São Paulo” of Tom Zé, into the blazing Egypt of the Cure (“Fire In Cairo”) and further south still, to South Africa, through the “Johannesburg” of ghetto poet Gil Scott-Heron. Not forgetting the vast Asian continent, represented here by four major capitals: the Vietnamese “Saigon” (Martha And The Muffins), “Singapore” (Tom Waits), Beijing (Patrick Watson – “Beijing”) and Tokyo, the ideal stage for the stellar (and unrepeatable) rendez-vous between David Sylvian and Giorgio Moroder, on the Japan single “Life In Tokyo”.