LA NIÑA - Furèsta

When a few years ago we were getting acquainted with Carola Moccia, known by the stage name La Niña, it was easy to think of her as a sort of Neapolitan Rosalia. It's a comparison that still partly holds up, given that the marriage of urban influences (reggaeton, trap, etc.) and local folk is indeed the central idea behind both artists' music. And yet, this “Furèsta” (the follow-up to 2023's “Vanitas”) reveals intentions quite different from those of the Catalan superstar. While Rosalia tones down her folkloric soul album after album, gradually pruning the flamenco roots of her music, La Niña (at least for now) is doing exactly the opposite, digging ever deeper into tradition while scaling back the contemporary component. Carola's work of recovery – almost an excavation – of tradition turns “Furèsta” into a folkloric universe that extends well beyond the borders of Naples and Neapolitan culture, embracing much of Southern Italy (just think of the Apulian castanets on “O ballo d' 'e 'mpennate”) and crossing the Mediterranean as far as the Middle East (the muezzin-like litanies of Abdullah Miniawi on “Sanghe”).

La Niña's research proceeds hand in hand with a remarkable elaboration of sound, which revitalizes old canons with electronic twists and modern rhythmic solutions – a process that recalls, more than the aforementioned Rosalia, the refined Asturian singer-songwriter Rodrigo Cuevas (whose excellent “Manual de romería” is well worth seeking out). In just two minutes, “Guapparia” makes clear why La Niña, beyond a character strongly devoted to female empowerment, is generating so much buzz across the peninsula: the chorus, duly hurled into the middle of a storm of tammorra drums and plucked mandolins, is simply irresistible.
Just a touch less euphoric, “Figlia d' 'a tempesta” matches the immediacy of the opening track and, as they say where Moccia's from, hits the jackpot in streaming numbers.
The range of possibilities on “Furèsta” doesn't stop at these chart-ready avant-folk anthems though, so the tracklist also features an apocryphal arrangement of De Simone (“Oinè”) as well as telluric electronics with a deconstructed-club bent (“Tremm”). No less authentic are the slow-burning “Ahi” and “Chiena 'e scippe”, the former steeped in languid mandolin arrangements and the latter set among hazy synthesizers, effective in bringing out the scratches referenced in the title (which also appear on the album cover).

Less mysterious, but also less pretentious (if I may say so), than that other homegrown media sensation known as Daniela Pes, with “Furèsta” La Niña is succeeding in the mission of winning over a cross-generational audience with wide-ranging tastes. And she's doing it with a handful of songs that are certainly catchy, striking even, but never ever predictable.

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15/04/2025