Ustmamò - From the Apennines to Bristol

The Mountain Rebels

In the bright Italian indie scene of the '90s, the star of Üstmamò also shone brightly, if only for a short while - tied to the CCCP-CSI constellation and capable of exporting the sounds of paranoid Emilia across Europe, crafting intriguing electronic shortcuts able to act as an ideal bridge between the revival of certain traditions from the Reggio Apennines and the trip-hop mecca of Bristol. Formed in 1991 on the initiative of Luca A. Rossi and Ezio Bonicelli, they were soon joined by Simone Filippi and Mara Redeghieri, who would become the face, the image and the main voice of the band.

Immediately taken under the protective wing of Giovanni Lindo Ferretti - a move that would speed up their rise within the national alternative circuit - they released their self-titled debut album, Üstmamò, that very same year, 1991: an unclassifiable folk-pop-rock grab-bag that stood out with real character against the musical landscape of the time, veering sharply away from the guitar-driven sounds that saturated the scene in those years (grunge fury, noise dissonance, hardcore rigidity), sounds that would shortly after be better embodied in Italy by bands such as Afterhours, Marlene Kuntz, Uzeda and One Dimensional Man. Luca A. Rossi's creation wasn't just a melting pot of styles, but also a Babel of languages: the lyrics move between Italian, English, French and the dialect of Reggio Emilia, from which the word "Üstmamò" is drawn, roughly translatable as "right now". And indeed it was the right moment - the era of occupied social centres and an alternative scene about to burst its banks, laying the groundwork for its own golden age, and Üstmamò were full-fledged protagonists of it, living it to the fullest.

"Üstmamò" is also the title of the energetic song that opens the album: delivered in the dialect of the band's home turf, the area between Villa Minozzo and Castelnuovo ne' Monti, it would immediately become the group's official anthem. Already by the following track, "Filikudi", another classic of theirs, the intimate bond with the CCCP's path is clear, taken as an ideal point of reference. Üstmamò is an album that moves across multiple stylistic planes, from the wave sound of "Stupido sguardo" to the folk traditions evoked in "Strocca – Canzone d'accatto" and "Amminramp", from the combat-folk (in the vein of "we were Zen Circus before you") of "Lieto evento finale" to the guitar-noise of "Vietato vietato", from the mazurka of "100 pecore e un montone" to the folkloric interludes "Vengo a voi…" and "Torna maggio".
Constantly balanced between punk and folklore, the omnivorous Üstmamò shows an occasionally childlike approach ("Fila filastrocca", "C'era una volta un re") onto which guitars are always ready to graft themselves. In an era where crossover and contamination were making the headlines, Üstmamò's debut, for all its inevitable naivety, arrived with perfect timing. And the prodigious minds of the Consorzio would be the first to realise it.

"Here's tonight's programme: Üstmamò kick things off and play for about half an hour, then Disciplinatha follow for another half hour, and then, as you all know... quite exceptionally... the Consorzio dei Suonatori Indipendenti, CSI, will play for you." It must have been an unforgettable day, that 18th of September 1992. The voice of Giovanni Lindo Ferretti himself, immortalised on the physical release, introduces the protagonists of the "Festival delle Colline", held at the Centro per l'Arte Contemporanea Luigi Pecci in Prato. Some of the most compelling avant-garde acts of the Italian underground shared the stage for what was meant to be a one-off event, but which would turn into a mini-tour in February 1993.
That concert would remain etched in the collective memory, and not only in the eyes of those present, thanks to the recording captured on the live album Maciste Against Everyone. Mara Redeghieri's band played first, performing "Üstmamò", "Amminramp", "Vietato Vietato" and a punk reinterpretation of "Finkela Barkava", a fitting cover of an old Orietta Berti song. Ferretti once again proved himself a mentor to the young talents circling the Italian alternative rock underground, not only through record productions via his own network of labels, but also by hosting new bands as openers for his own sets, and even performing covers of their songs himself, as he would do with Marlene Kuntz's "Lieve", served up to Generation X kids after being included on the CSI live album "In quiete".

Trans-European patchanka

At this point Üstmamò were flying high, but pulling together the material needed to complete their second chapter was anything but simple. Coming from a melting pot of pop like the one on the debut, there was a real risk of repeating themselves, losing the thrill of novelty. So on the more "considered" Üstmamò II, a certain use of electronics begins to creep in. The intent, which would later be confirmed and expanded on subsequent albums, was to shake off the overly "local" imprint in search of a more international tone. Traditional sounds ("Omaggio", "Ageo", where the violin triumphs) are thus overlaid with dub drifts, creating a hybrid, a sort of patchanka that doesn't look solely at what was happening in Bristol at the time ("Intetemp", "Rollamaffi") but aspires to be trans-European.
The guitars spin superbly on "Tannomai", "Lepre (cattura della)" and "Annegherò nel dolo", dance-hall and punk tie the knot happily on "Mamme e monti" (complete with a nod to the theme tune of the cartoon "Heidi"), while the rap aggression of "Killer Ghenga Radiostampa" seems to hint at a coexistence between Sonic Youth and the earliest Massimo Volume. What's most striking, though, are the tracks that shift shape mid-flight, especially "Malinconici" and "Cuore di segatura", which start out sweet before rippling with real force (Prozac + would take notes from the latter when building their own hits). What emerges is an attempt to smooth out the sound while remaining strictly "alternative", the search for the track capable of bringing the band to a wider audience. But to get there, they'd have to wait for the next record.

Meanwhile - and this would only become clear with hindsight - Mara's own songwriting was starting to shift the band's compositional mechanics, contributing decisively to the quartet's later stylistic migrations. It's said that in the early days, especially on the first album, some suggestions coming from the CSI family had been useful, decisive in weaving together a situation "faithful to the line". From the second record onward, the contribution coming from Redeghieri's pen would grow steadily, and she would also become a songwriter sought after by other artists.
Her biggest hit she co-wrote with Gianna Nannini, "Meravigliosa creatura", released in early 1995 and the lead single from the Tuscan singer's album "Dispetto". It became a hit, and in 2007, a full twelve years later, it climbed back up the sales charts after being chosen as the soundtrack for a Fiat Bravo TV advert. It would be Nannini's third number one. In 2004, "Meravigliosa creatura" was included, in a new arrangement, on the compilation Perle, which also featured the previously unreleased cover of CCCP's "Amandoti". Small circles closing...

The underground cult status earned by Üstmamò with their first two albums led them to build up a live schedule that became very intense in those years. Live clubs all over Italy were happy to host them, and Milan's Leoncavallo social centre even turned one of their performances into an album.
In 1994, Leoncavallo Live, released by Leoncavallo Musika, thus became their only true official live album, a best-of captured live featuring thirteen of the songs the band played most during those months on the road.

Unfaithful to the line

After establishing themselves as the most eccentric act in the colourful stable of Dischi del Mulo, the label run by Cccp-Csi, Üstmamò decided to be even more "unfaithful to the line", opening up their sound to pop. The mastermind behind the operation was a seasoned alchemist like Roberto Vernetti (who had already worked alongside Casino Royale, Almamegretta, Daniele Silvestri, Elio e le Storie Tese), who produced their third album, Üst (1996), plunging it into a bubbling cauldron of hip-hop, reggae and dub sounds. The result would be exhilarating: a success beyond all expectations.
Üst is one of those records that seizes the moment, that pins down a sound by channelling the inspiration of a band at the peak of its creative powers. Every track is driven by an unprecedented hybrid groove, in which warm Italian melodies with folk roots meld with the cold, pulsing beat of electronics. It's a spell you can feel from the first vaguely Eastern notes of the opener "Cuore/Amore", a sinuous and at the same time mocking lullaby that sketches out a new female iconography, entirely shaped around Mara Redeghieri's raw, feral sensuality:

⟦Q1⟧

The firebrand from the Apennines takes the stage with her cutting voice and biting sarcasm, lashing out first at the standardised femme fatale of "Baby Dull" ("Tu mi rapisci il cuore, donna di plastica, hai gli occhi un po' sbarrati, ma sei fantastica"), then at the crowd of personals-ad seekers, hanging on the voicemail of "Memobox". A bizarre zoo of hungry men and "transerotic sirens", pilloried with a volley of hilarious lines over an insistent dub groove:

⟦Q2⟧

Üstmamò's irreverent verse marks a step up in quality within the "independent musicians" circuit, turning CCCP-style militant satire into a more disenchanted approach, less solemn and dogmatic, yet just as uncompromising. Musically, though, the peak is "Canto del vuoto", a superb electronic ballad that condenses all the desolate, lost spirit of the record: a vibrant anthem for all those who live "now lost in the deep sea, now up high brushing the peaks, embracing the passing of time, waiting for a good reason". With that "look to the future" chanted over a wall of beats that sounds more like a threat than an exhortation. Redeghieri, with her persuasive, passionate voice, stands as the siren of a disoriented generation, living on by continuing to "let go, sway and float, sliding over things".
They too are the victims of an inhumane society, ruled only by those "stock market indices, free market indices", repeated obsessively like a mantra over reggae pulses in the track on the album closest to Massive Attack ("Indice di Borsa", sung by Luca A. Rossi), complete with a mocking "dedication" to the Berlusconi empire: "Fininvest invest invest ki lu (chape lì)". An increasingly technologised and alienating society, that of the mid-90s, no longer looking at itself in the mirror but at the "screen of my desires" of a computer, delegating to it every form of thought and creativity, as the ruthless "Schermo splendente" accuses without mincing words, over a scorching magma of beats, guitar feedback and electrified strings:

⟦Q3⟧

But Üstmamò aren't (only) a political band, as proven by the most intimate track of the set, "Piano con l'affetto", in which a moving Redeghieri, in anguished, Beth Gibbons-like form, lays bare all her emotional fragility amid sweet violin embroidery and the distant thunder of a storm:

You inject me with diabolical juices
I have no antidotes
Your attentions destroy me
And your famished eyes
I keep telling you, go easy with affection
Please, leave me
Just for a moment
Let me breathe with my own breath

And while "Onde sulle onde" confirms the brilliance of this gripping trip-hop-punk hybrid, showcasing yet another formidable performance from the vocalist that dissolves into a tender acoustic ending, the rocking "Biguldun" (Loafer) — sung by guitarist Simone Filippi — remains the only track in dialect, while the successful cover of the partisan song "Siamo i ribelli della montagna", placed at the close of the album, would go on to become one of the live staples for the Emilian band. In short, a virtually flawless record, one that showcases both the singer's full theatrical talent and the sonic cohesion of a tightly-knit band, with notable drumming work from Marco "Ciusky" Barberis, who we'll later find alongside Mau Mau.
With its cheeky, irreverent pop anthems, Üst breaks through on radio and music TV, and wins over critics, giving the Emilian outfit the biggest success of their career. All without disowning their folk roots, because — as they themselves recounted in an interview with Mucchio Selvaggio — "we came to realize we were living somewhere different from U2 or Siouxsie: we were in Italy, in the Apennines, and we tried to dig deeper into our ties to our land and our musical traditions. What we found gave us a sense of belonging, and once you're certain of your own identity and where you come from, it's easier to decide to go somewhere else. Which, in musical terms, is exactly what we did."

To crown this intoxicating run of success came the unthinkable: the small Emilian band was chosen by none other than David Bowie to open the Italian dates of the Outside Tour. "In the end he came backstage, shook hands with some of us and complimented us: we were stunned," the Üstmamò recalled, still visibly thrilled.

In 1996, Virgin, looking to cash in on the success of the previous record, put together the compilation Baby Dull. It's a mini-album containing five live tracks, among which a particularly interesting one is a nearly thirteen-minute dub version of "Filikudi" (fittingly renamed "Filidub"), plus a dub remix of "Canto nel vuoto".
Opening the tracklist is a Moloko remix version of "Baby Dull", in which — over a synthetic backing — Mara Redeghieri's voice seems to openly take inspiration from the new darling of alt-rock audiences: Cristiano Godano of Marlene Kuntz, another band that emerged from the Consorzio Produttori Indipendenti circuit and quickly made a name for themselves thanks to their startling, cathartic debut.

Mara Redeghieri, meanwhile, even dabbled in cinema, playing the role of a university teaching assistant in the film "Tutti giù per terra", directed in 1997 by Davide Ferrario, starring Valerio Mastandrea, Carlo Monni and Caterina Caselli.

Polvere di stelle

Buoyed by the success of their bold new formula, Üstmamò shut themselves away in the small basement studio in Villa Minozzo to work on an album that could both consolidate and update it. Mission accomplished with Stard'Üst (1998), inspired and (self-)ironic right from the title, even if slightly less consistent than its predecessor. This time bassist Luca Rossi takes the producer's chair, and the intent is clear: to survey the most intriguing styles of turn-of-the-millennium electronic pop and blend them into an even more compact, sophisticated sonic cocktail, leaning further into manipulation with heavy use of backing tracks, scratching and sampling as a frame for Redeghieri's always intense and original performances. It's an approach that effectively makes them "the Italian Portishead", even though these rebels of the Emilian mountains can boast a distinctly Italian sense of melody and a folk imprint inherited from the noble tradition of popular and protest song. The result is what Federico Guglielmi, writing in Mucchio Selvaggio, would describe as "a fluid, kaleidoscopic sonic collage in the name of a modern total pop, whose constituent elements — electronic, acoustic, electric, trip, trance/dance, psychedelic, classical, experimental, at times even rock — blend together frictionlessly in a style more devoted than ever to the fascinating game of contamination."
This time round too there's no shortage of high-impact pop anthems, such as the two singles "Cosa conta" and "Kemiospiritual". The former, hypnotic and infectious, would remain one of their biggest hits, thanks to a refined blend of hazy textures (soft, enveloping beats, vintage keyboards, wah-wah guitar, airy trumpet resonances) and the scratchy vocalizing of a wild Redeghieri, grappling with another free-flowing existential reflection: “Sto pensando a camminare/ Non m’importa di arrivare/ Non ho un posto né una meta/ Una mia stella cometa”. Another sweeping chorus, propped up by sturdy guitar riffs and driving beats, launches the falsely reassuring litany of "Kemiospiritual" into orbit, in impossible pursuit of a miraculous fluid that might heal every suffering, including those of the soul:

Now that the time has come that heals every ill
Passes through every pain, clear lymph
Now that there's a right time to start again
Bring me every good thing in your heart, clear lymph

The scratches that scar the mournful chant of "Mai più" are a further link to the Portishead blueprint, also evoked by the afflicted vocals of a troubled Redeghieri, who nonetheless never fails to stress the distinctiveness of her vocal performances — in effect a new singing style that would influence countless aspiring Italian vocalists, though without ever truly finding an heir.
Compared to trip-hop from across the Channel, though, Üstmamò prove even more eclectic, tossing into the mix ethnic and psychedelic suggestions too (the Zen musings of the Eastern-tinged "Nostre altre vite"), bizarre dialect digressions over a dub backdrop ("Open Cojon") and heartfelt tributes to reggae ("Minimale"), another high point of the record, in which the Jamaican genre is enriched with trumpets, electronic samples and electric guitar lines acting as a counterpoint to another poignant performance from the singer.
Redeghieri also proves her worth as the author of refined, sensitive, cutting lyrics, from "Stammi vicino", which feels like the sequel and natural counterpart to "Piano con l'affetto", to the new snapshot of existential unease portrayed with great lyrical power in "Rosa di rabbia":

Dry the desert that echoes in your throat, you're dying of thirst, nothing consoles you
And incandescent lava and dense, atrocious smoke
Turn your eyes into red embers
Timid red moon, silent black moon, throbbing cloud weeps heartbroken drops

The more electronic side of the project, meanwhile, comes to a head in the house pulsations of the dancefloor-ready "Opera Soap" — with Redeghieri in irreverent bride mode (“Cuore a cuore, mano nella mano/ In riva al mare fino all’altare/ Cuciremo i nostri cuori/ Finché morte non ci separi”) — and in the gripping drum'n'bass of the long title track, which closes the album with a blazing, almost big-beat-style coda somewhat in the vein of Prodigy.
Enhanced by the mixing of a sound engineer as prestigious as Danton Supple (Brian Eno, U2, Passengers), Stard'Üst fully lives up to the expectations of those who had hailed its celebrated predecessor as a miracle, making up on the sound front for what is sometimes lost in immediacy and melodic freshness, and confirming the full imagination and personality of one of the smartest bands on the already rich Italian indie scene of the '90s.

All Good?

In the new millennium, however, something seems to have broken for good. The breakup of Csi marks a watershed, the end of a season of extraordinary creativity and political and poetic inspiration, during which Ferretti and his bandmates had stood as the undisputed beacon for an entire generation of artists. The fallout doesn't spare even their protégés Üstmamò. Their return after three years with All Good (2001) marks, in fact, a failed attempt to recapture the sound that had defined their origins: less electronics and more guitars, then, but what's really missing are the songs themselves and the melodic hooks that had served the Emilian band so well in the previous decade. From the opening, gentle "Come me" you can already sense something is missing: the delicate guitar arrangements propping up Redeghieri's slender vocals dissipate the groove without adding any particular melodic insight, much like the orchestral-ballad tones, complete with string arrangement, of the single "Nell'aria"; while "Secondo incantesimo" boasts lyrics written by Paolo Benvegnù of Scisma, which suit Redeghieri's voice well but aren't matched by a convincing musical frame, ending up lost in an evanescent languor.
Even the more energetic moments (the post-punk surges of "Lunga vita" and "Bum", with their rough guitar scrapes, the folk-rock echoes of "Sempreverdi", with banjo flourishes) have lost their shine, while the new "anti-capitalist" invective against the "well-dressed loan sharks" of "Bank Of Fuck Off" fails to recapture the caustic irony of a "Memobox", ending up drowned in wordiness and an improbable coda of bouzouki and violins. Better, if anything, are moments like "Per gioco" and "Brava e buona", where, amid samples, beats and a sly, understated laziness, the band tries to recover the balance of the two previous records. But too often the record feels like it's spinning its wheels, merely restating already well-worn stylistic tics, with undeniable craft but also with the ever-present risk that it really is — to borrow the title of another track — "Tre volte noia".

Scioglimento, antologie e progetti paralleli

At this point — inevitably — came the breakup. In 2003 the compilation ÜstBestMamò would bring together sixteen of the group's finest moments under one roof, plus a cover of Alberto Camerini's famous song "Rock'n'Roll Robot". A further anthology, Essential, with a very similar tracklist but trimmed down to just twelve tracks, would be released by Emi in 2012.
Over the years, the former members of the group would remain close friends, even as they chose to pursue divergent artistic paths. Mara Redeghieri would always stay tied to the folk tradition of her homeland, while Luca Rossi would find himself drawn more toward the blues.

In 2000, Luca Rossi and Simone Filippi launched the Fennec project, bringing in musician Ageo, for whom Rossi had produced an album two years earlier. With just one album to their name, Virtual Honeymoon, released in 2003 on Virgin, the project marked a substantial departure from Üstmamò's previous work. Fennec's sound was a blend of lounge, soul, acid jazz, dub and psychedelia which, while interesting, failed to gain any lasting traction.
In 2005, Ezio Bonicelli would accompany Giovanni Lindo Ferretti in the theatrical production "Pascolare parole, alleviare pensieri". That collaboration was reinforced by Bonicelli and Rossi's presence as the backing band for Ferretti's hugely popular solo tour, "A cuor leggero", which has effectively been running since 2011, bringing his entire musical journey back to the stage, starting with some classics from the Cccp repertoire. Bonicelli and Rossi prove perfect at giving the songs a new electric dress, while remaining faithful to the originals.

Mara Redeghieri, for her part, withdrew from the spotlight for a long stretch, dedicating herself to teaching English at a middle school in the town where she lives. One of her few departures from this routine came with the soundtrack to Gabriele Salvatores' film starring Sergio Rubini, "Denti", for which she recorded "Word Back" in 2000.
She also founded a choir of female voices: forty-five women performing folk songs from the Apennines, the kind once sung in taverns and now almost entirely forgotten. Women who had never sung before, taking a repertoire of several dozen traditional songs around the small towns of the region.

In parallel, Redeghieri took on the Dio Valzer project, dedicated to recovering and spreading awareness of old partisan songs. The project resulted in two albums (Anarcho-syndicalist folk songs in 2005, Attanadara in 2010) and a tour centered on performances of a series of anarchist and rebellion ballads, in collaboration with musicians Lorenzo Valdesalici and Nicola Bonacini.
We would later learn that Mara's attempts to build a credible solo career were repeatedly interrupted by a series of health problems, which kept her away from the stage for months at a time on several occasions. But an extraordinary force of will would eventually pay off.

The spark that reignited her dormant creativity was a documentary by Marco Mensa about folk songs from the Apennines, "about our traditions, about the roots of what for us, as inhabitants of these valleys, is something more than simply old-time music", as Redeghieri put it. And so, in 2017 she decided to try again with Recidiva, the first album released under her own name, a title loaded with meaning, inspired not only by the illness recurring but, above all, by the fact of having fallen into it again — of not knowing how to stay away from music.
Recidiva is eleven songs forming a puzzle of bittersweet stories and fables, often seasoned with biting irony, starting with the single "Augh", a tribal-rhythmed invective against rampant capitalism, delivered in a mock Native American slang with verbs left in the infinitive, in an amusing gag that exposes the ignorance underlying greed and racism, rendered vividly in a comic video in which Mara, armed with a bow and arrows, skewers a puppet resembling Donald Trump. The ineffable (former) President of the United States also gets the all-too-explicit funk broadside "STrump". Along the same lines, but with a good deal more bitterness, there's the other electric chant "UomoNero", in which the raw subject of immigration is told through a play of contrasts, not only chromatic ones.
On Recidiva, Mara retains that dazed, almost childlike approach of hers, even when handling dramatic material. She glides through the songs with the same lightness that made the triumphs of the past. Some clear ties to that experience remain (the trip-hop pulse, the taste for theatrical storytelling and nursery-rhyme cadences), though along the way some melodic sparkle is perhaps lost. What's confirmed, however, is her personal vocal talent, with that way of leaning into words (sublime on the Bjork-esque, strings-and-electronics number "Anni luce"), of launching into unlikely tongue-twisters bordering on rap, or of baring herself in bare-bones spoken passages (the title track) or in three-part vocals ("Nella casa"). A "Romantica siderale", as she calls herself on one of the most visionary and lyrical tracks, set against the aridity of capitalism's new monsters, sketched out in the reggae of "Cupamente". Recidiva is a deliberately untimely record, at times almost naive, much like its protagonist, yet still tethered to the present, with its desperate spirit of resistance and disarming irony.

On that occasion, her mentor Ferretti also came out with an affectionate dedication on Facebook: "Dear, dearest Mara. Bitter 'she-ass, creative mule'. Looking and looking again at you in these domestic images 'from blood to heart'. Face, eyes and mouth. Feet and floor, hands and door, window, gestures and grimaces. How could one not love you? ALIVE, 'amid endless mistakes' and 'alone as everyone must be'".
In 2019, a reissue of the album was released, titled Recidiva +, a collection of duets and remix versions featuring major guests. Appearing, in order, are friends and colleagues Gianna Nannini, Luca Carboni, Orietta Berti, Rachele Bastreghi, Mauro Ermanno Giovanardi, Antonella Ruggiero, Beatrice Antolini, Lele Battista and Raiz.

The solo path now seems an irreversible choice for the Emilian singer, who, when asked about a possible reunion with her former bandmates, replies bluntly: "Not even if I were dead! It would be like going to dinner with your middle-school classmates. I'm not going!".

Üstmamò's second life

Meanwhile, in 2015 Luca A. Rossi had kicked off Üstmamò's second life, with Simone Filippi happily on board. The break with the past is stark. For one thing, Ezio Bonicelli and Mara Redeghieri don't take part in the reunion — the latter's absence, while not undermining the project's credibility, does leave many wondering what the real point of this new chapter is. But the absence of the historic singer's voice isn't the only novelty: after a full fourteen years, the band's new album is sung entirely in English and marks a jarring, decisive shift in musical direction. Gone is the sometimes-saccharine pop of the past, gone too are both the combat-folk and the trip-hop; on Duty Free Rockets the guitars change tone, leaning decisively toward a certain "Americana" sound, often via slide guitar, blending desert haze, bluesy nods and roots textures.
You could call it western-blues, with nine original tracks alongside two covers: "Don't Go To Strangers", known from J.J. Cale's rendition, and "Hambone", a country/rock'n'roll classic written by Carl Perkins. There's an air of endless prairies and bourbon sipped on the porch at sunset ("Done", "I Want To Tell You"), all delivered with class and elegance, never overdone, but not shying away from a few welcome electric surges either ("The Last Trap", "Wha Wha Wind").

Three years later, this new incarnation of Üstmamò produced a second chapter, Il giardino che non vedi, the completion of a kind of homecoming, a renewed bond with their native land, placing the places of the Apennines back at the center, both as a kind of salvation and as an expression of gratitude, turning them into a genuine point of departure. Italian returns as the language of choice, thanks also to valuable contributions from collaborators ranging from Marco Menardi of Wolfango (another band that in the '90s ended up in the orbit of Ferretti/Zamboni's I Dischi del Mulo label) to Modena-based writer Sandro Campani, as well as Silvia Barbantini, who briefly sang in Üstmamò's very first line-up.
The approach still hinges on Rossi's guitars, suspended amid reverbs that on their own already paint meadows and valleys, but shows a more organic ability to absorb the band's past and present, as in the electronic touches of "Una volta era meglio" and "La luna alla Tv" (a tribute to Ageo, who recently passed away), which quietly bring back a bit of that breeze from their chart-topping years. What gains value here are the simple, well-established elements — shared memories and musical references drawn from years of friendship and collaboration, underlining the richness of belonging to a small community far from the world's noise ("Siamo di qua"), a heritage that also makes room for the harshness of nature ("Vieni avvicinati"). At times the river Secchia disguises itself as the Mississippi ("Sono andato nel campo", "Piccola nave"), and the land it flows through becomes the ideal backdrop for flashes of Calexico ("E sai cosa c'è") and of U2's "The Joshua Tree" era ("Il buio sospeso").
Il giardino che non vedi, made possible by a crowdfunding campaign, is an honest portrait of what Üstmamò is today, best appreciated when one avoids comparing it to the Redeghieri era: even in the development of the lyrics, there no longer seems to be room for that same way of describing the world.

Setting aside the small "betrayal" of Duty Free Rockets, what remains of the original band shows a determination to stay true to its geographic roots, keeping a strong bond with its home territory. It's a risky choice, not lacking in character, and not far removed from that ideal of "mountain rebels" they paid tribute to twenty years earlier. A choice that (unknowingly?) brings them closer to the artistic choices made by Mara as a solo artist, hinting at the possibility of a future rapprochement — one that Redeghieri herself has good-naturedly shot down in a recent interview, saying that getting back together would be like going to dinner with middle-school classmates, something she says she'd rather avoid. Candid admissions, delivered as ever with a smile, proudly standing by the journey she shared in the past with her former bandmates.

In October 2020, in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, the surviving members of Üstmamò released a new single, "People In The Middle": it's yet another shift in direction, through which they return to English and introduce more contemporary rhythms, leaning toward hip-hop.
It isn't a preview of a new album, but rather the first in a series of songs that would be released over the following months.

Contributions by Paolo Ciro ("Il giardino che non vedi")
Opening photo by Fabrizio Cicconi

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