Italy in odd time signatures
A guide to Italian prog in 50 albums
Why did we leave Italy out of our special on "other prog"?
In one of this site's previous chapters on the history of rock, titled "The Other Prog", we turned our attention to prog produced in countries outside the Anglophone cultural empire. Among those left out of that deep dive, besides the obvious Great Britain and United States, was also Italy. The choice was a pragmatic one: the article aimed to rediscover albums that had defined scenes considered (sometimes rightly, far more often wrongly) peripheral.
Criticism and journalism on popular music have always been transfixed by Great Britain and the United States like a cobra by a snake charmer's pungi. Even nations of enormous cultural importance like France or Germany are considered peripheral, let alone Southeast Asia, South America, or Eastern Europe, just to name a few of the areas covered on that occasion. Very few non-English-speaking artists manage to catch the attention of international insiders.
If Italy was excluded, it was because, in this specific field, the obtuse automatic assumption that any non-English-speaking nation is inferior by definition doesn't kick in. The Italian prog scene is, in all likelihood, the most collected in the world after the British one, and it far outstrips the American scene (though, admittedly, the US never produced all that much prog).
It's telling that in the best-known online database dedicated to progressive rock, Progarchives, Italy is one of only two countries - the other being Germany krautrock - to boast a subcategory named after itself: a distinction Great Britain couldn't aspire to, being the birthplace progand of almost all its offshoots (it's taken for granted that the various strands, except where otherwise specified, originate from there), while other nations couldn't, since their scenes aren't considered significant enough.
Given that krautrock is widely regarded - with strong arguments behind it - as a genre apart, "Italian progressive rock" takes on an even more central role in its own homegrown distinctiveness. It's therefore obvious that a country so important to the development of prog, and with such a level of renown among fans, was unsuited to being part of a book aimed at reappraising scenes that Western criticism has yet to celebrate.
(F. Romagnoli)
Progpolitik
Why did such an imposing prog scene develop specifically in our country? Giving a clear, clean-cut answer is no easy task, since it involves a tangle of causes, a perpetual back-and-forth between political and artistic circumstances, ranging from the interplay between parties and their electoral base to the structure of the music market.
Progressive rock in the English-speaking world had no political bent: it could serve as social commentary (the Jethro Tull singing about the much-maligned clochard Aqualungthe King Crimson and the schizoid man of the twenty-first century), yet it almost never took on radical stances or strongly marked political colors. Most of the genre grappled with philosophy (Moody Blues) and spirituality (Yes), or even more frequently invented fairy-tale scenarios of complete escape from reality, almost as a reaction to the season of psychedelia and social rebellion, a dream now considered a failure. Rock In Opposition is barely relevant here: it took shape when prog was already in decline and remained a marginal, entirely underground phenomenon.
In Italy the political neutrality of prog went largely unnoticed, probably also due to the very poor knowledge of English that characterized the country at the time. What was perceived, instead, was its capacity to dismantle the dominant song form. The song was fragmented and stretched out, stripped of its typical structural backbone made up of the precise alternation of verse and chorus, following unusual time signatures and instrumental digressions unheard of until then. If you analyze the musical structure of prog records, their anarchic power – in that they were formally opposed to a formula that had until then dominated their reference market – is obvious, and grasping it doesn't require understanding the lyrics.
It isn't hard to guess the "two plus two" that this purely musical perception, stripped of the context provided by lyrics, generated in Italy: if the music lashes out against the established order, it's obvious that the work as a whole must be doing so too.
Ours was the democratic country with the largest Communist party in Europe, not to mention certain sensational actions by the extra-parliamentary left, and the ideologization of music left its mark on the intelligentsia and the student movements of the Seventies: the episodes and anecdotes one could recount on the subject are countless, from the boycott against Lou Reed to the trial against De Gregori, from the accusations of fascism levelled at Lucio Battisti to the proliferation of independent festivals and radio stations. In such a context, prog had fertile ground in which to bloom, and it did bloom, in its most sincere and politically engaged dimension.
This political connotation even sparked an internal dialogue within the genre: Alphataurus, for instance, were blatantly Catholic and likely sympathetic to the Christian Democrats, as were rumored to be the Orme (though moderate enough never to expose themselves on the matter).
In Britain, a similar mechanism of political exchange between the various exponents of the movement, and between them and their reference audience, never took place.
It could, however, have happened in France, the country that according to many historians is culturally closest to us, our great European sister nation, the only other democratic country that, at the dawn of the prog era, had an extremely strong Communist party. Yet it didn't happen, for reasons endemic to the local music market.
Up to that point France had been practically immune to bands. The market was dominated, and would remain so for a long time to come, by solo artists. The chansonnier monopolized the sphere of political and social song, French Pop occupied the more carefree, youthful fringe, Beatles e Rolling Stones had left no local heirs, unlike what happened in many other countries around the world.
With such a supremacy of the solo singer figure, it's difficult to impose a movement steeped in instrumental digression. Prog thus landed in France, and even managed to carve out its own niche (every Ange album sold over a hundred thousand copies), but going from there to invading universities, clubs, party rallies and state television, as happened here in Italy, was a long stretch. Italy's beat era – with the likes of Equipe 84, Dik Dik, Camaleonti and Giganti – had in fact kept a slice of the market fertile that in France would remain frozen until the new wave by Télécom first and Indochine later on (though still remaining a minority interest). Looking back, after all, Italy had been the country of Quartetto Cetra and Trio Lescano, while France had been the country of Édith Piaf and Charles Trenet.
The comparison between Italy and France explains why, under broadly comparable political and social conditions, one country produced a prog school capable of leaving a strong mark on local culture while the other did not. Setting France aside, there were no other nations in a situation similar to ours: Spain, Latin America, Eastern Europe and Southeast Asia were all in the grip of dictatorships, while Japan was a strongly right-leaning country with a very rigid social structure, less inclined toward political debate.
(F. Romagnoli)
Quantity or quality?The previous sections were not meant to prove the superiority of the Italian scene over others, but rather its greater impact and reach. It's not simply a matter of having penetrated the younger strata of society so deeply as to produce musicians in that vein everywhere across the peninsula, even in the most remote provincial towns (although, to find real outlets, they still had to migrate to the big cities). The situation is more complex than that.
According to Progarchives, 212 albums that could in some way be filed under the prog umbrella were released in Italy during the Seventies, and France is the only country that comes close for comparison, albeit already trailing by a fair margin (stopping at 177). Looking at the impact on local charts, though, there's no comparison at all. On one side, the heavyweight was the aforementioned Ange, with Malicorne as the only other name of note, while in Italy Le Orme were the second best-selling band of the decade after Pooh, and Premiata Forneria Marconi e Banco del Mutuo Soccorso also did very well. As for present-day prestige, only the Magma among the French acts can be compared to our great names.
This is probably what made our scene so appealing in the eyes of collectors worldwide: the sheer, disproportionate amount of material to draw from, combined with the aura of prestige granted by the reputation as "the country where progressive was mainstream". This can actually be documented, given that not only our own bands but also foreign ones did extremely well here:Emerson Lake & Palmer e Jethro Tull dominated the Italian charts more thoroughly than they ever managed with the British ones, and we even managed to bring into the spotlight acts such as Gentle Giant e Van Der Graaf Generator, true ghosts back home.
But here's the catch: the presence of several names capable of forcefully embedding themselves in the Italian youth of the era cast a reflected glow onto the names of the underground too, which still made up the vast majority. So people started digging for bands whose main merit was essentially having been Italian during the same period in which Orme, Banco and Pfm existed, then reading any resemblance to those bands as a further seal of quality. The result was an endless string of "rediscovered holy grails". Those grails were often albums that, at the time of their release, were pressed in a few thousand copies and generated no interest whatsoever among Italian audiences. Completely forgotten even by Italian insiders, they were rediscovered by chance by some Japanese enthusiast — a market that has always been devoted to reissuing exotic rarities — and brought back into circulation. When the news reached Italy, everyone jumped on the winning bandwagon, and with a touch of nationalistic hypocrisy, people flaunted the proof of a scene so valid that "even the Japanese envy it". A scene so valid, however, that the very same journalists now wielding it as a parochial cudgel had ignored until that very moment. Albums now regarded as absolute classics, on the lips of every prog rock fan, were obscure and unknown before they were brought back to us from the land of the Rising Sun. This doesn't mean that some of them don't deserve rediscovery, but the claim — made by many collectors — that every single one of them deserves it, down to the last one, is at the very least suspicious.
The guide that follows sets out to discuss fifty titles representative of Italian prog: it could have been extended much further, aiming to cover everything that was released, but only at the cost of burying the reader under a landslide of mediocre material, often a clumsy imitation of what has already been selected.
Fifty titles is already quite excessive, mind you: considering that "The Other Prog", covering almost the entire rest of the world, stopped at a hundred and fifty, such a long Italian list might, on the surface, seem to confirm the stereotype of an overwhelming superiority over any country other than Great Britain. In that previous guide, the most represented country was France with thirteen albums, followed by Sweden and Spain, with eleven each. If fifty are counted here, it's not because the Italian scene is considered superior to those three combined, but essentially for two reasons: first, an Italian audience might more readily complain about any omissions, being more familiar with our own scene than with the Swedish one; second, Italian progressive rock boasts — for all the reasons outlined so far, and not out of some "metaphysical" superiority as many believe — far more cult albums than those other scenes. Cult albums that therefore deserve discussion simply by virtue of being cult albums, regardless of their quality, which at times has clear limits.
That said, there's no wish to be destructive either: not all the bands presented below were extraordinary, but quite a few of them certainly were. As always, the truth emerges through moderation and clear-headedness: Italy certainly had a splendid school of progressive rock. One need only bear in mind that it wasn't the only one, nor necessarily the best (and besides, is it really so necessary to crown a "best" one?), nor one destined to make other, equally thriving scenes die of envy — as some would have it.
(F. Romagnoli)
The fifty records
Late psychedelia and proto-prog
The psychedelic season that had set Anglo-American generations ablaze in the second half of the Sixties only marginally seeped into Italy. Italy's generation of the time was decidedly more attached to beat music, but the transition to prog was swift and painless (just think of the metamorphosis of Giganti, achieved in little more than a year). If we were to pick out, through the mists of time, an album that could be defined as the perfect bridge between late psychedelia and newborn prog, it might well be the self-titled debut by Trip (1970), still tied to Sixties sounds but close to the new experiments of Pink Floyd and casting a tentative glance at the first two albums by King Crimson. A year later, another of the scene's key bands, Osanna, debuted with "L'Uomo", a more mature album, yet still firmly on the border between two worlds (psychedelia and prog) still taking shape.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Trip – The Trip (1970)
The adventure of Trip, led by singer and keyboardist Joe Vescovi, is one of the most interesting and pioneering stories of Italy between the Sixties and Seventies. Born in Savona, Vescovi is the protagonist of one of the strangest and most amusing episodes in our story. He joined the band after the departure of Ritchie Blackmore, future Deep Purple member. The self-titled debut album of the new Trip lineup is thus a pioneering and innovative work, one that can be seen as an incubator for the Italian progressive scene. Still exquisitely psychedelic, 1970's "The Trip" contains the seeds of a new vision of the relationship between musician and listener, a different approach to listening, and a greater compositional complexity, also influenced by the very earliest krautrock albums (the cosmic intro of "Prologo"), while still carrying echoes of Hendrix. The band would commit decisively to progressive rock only later, with the remarkable "Caronte" (1971) and "Atlantide" (1972).
(V. D'Onofrio)
Giganti – Terra in bocca(1971)
I Giganti carved themselves into the collective imagination of a generation with songs that today sound tremendously naive, such as "Tema" and "Proposta". Yet in 1971 they reached an unexpected peak of seriousness with this album, one of the earliest rock operas released in Italy. The lyrics by Pietro De Rossi, a journalist and friend of the band, tell a story of death and violence in a Sicily crushed by drought, with cosa nostra scheming and controlling the water supply from behind the scenes. The mafia is never named outright, but the verses are unmistakable: "Monday, gunfire at the fish market. Tuesday, they blow up a house with dynamite. Wednesday, a shepherd is killed out in the countryside. Thursday, they throw the water tanker off the pier" and so on. The music, arranged by Vince Tempera, still betrays a few faint beat-era traces, but between Mellotron, refined vocal harmonies, and instrumental digressions halfway between symphonic music and jazz-rock, the album's place within the prog universe is beyond question.
(F. Romagnoli)
Osanna – L'uomo(1971)
The debut album by Osanna can be considered, alongside that of Trip, the missing link between the psychedelic season and the first stirrings of progressive rock. Osanna are the leading band of the varied Neapolitan scene that, in the early Seventies, shaped an entirely different way of understanding progressive music. Formed by singer and guitarist Lino Vairetti, guitarist Danilo Rustici (brother of Corrado of Cervello), bassist Lello Brandi, drummer Massimo Guarino and saxophonist/flautist Elio D'Anna, a disciple of David Jackson of Van Der Graaf Generator, they debuted in 1971 with "L'uomo", a perfect example of psychedelic pop turning into prog, especially on the opening "Introduzione", a pioneering instrumental for Italy, followed by a series of highly complex tracks whose lyrics serve as a prelude to the philosophy tied to humanity's most authentic needs, which would find its ultimate expression in "Palepoli".
(V. D'Onofrio)
Collaborations with Bacalov
Another element underlining the closeness between Italian prog and classical music is the repeated and fruitful collaboration with Argentine-Italian composer and pianist Luis Bacalov, already well known in Italy for his ties to the pop world. In an era of genre film soundtracks written by great composers such as Ennio Morricone or Franco Micalizzi, a meeting between these two only seemingly hard-to-reconcile worlds was bound to happen. The collaboration began with New Trolls' "Concerto Grosso" (1971), continued with Osanna's "Milano Calibro 9" (1972), and ended with Rovescio della Medaglia's "Contaminazione" (1973). It would resurface in 1976 with New Trolls' "Concerto grosso n. 2".
(V. D'Onofrio)
New Trolls – Concerto grosso per i New Trolls (1971)
New Trolls had already produced an album more ambitious than the average Italian beat record, namely "Senza orario senza bandiera", with lyrics by poet Riccardo Mannerini (adapted by Fabrizio De André), and arrangements by Gian Piero Reverberi. It's no surprise, then, that they jumped on the progressive rock bandwagon once the time came. "Concerto grosso" is a baroque composition in four movements, and shows an attempt to blend different worlds that, even as they merge, always remain themselves. With poetic Shakespearean references ("Amleto"), solos by Hendrix-inspired and Luis Bacalov's symphonic strings, this album is probably one of the high points of a particular strand of prog that emerged distinctively in our country. The album closes with "Nella sala vuota – Improvvisazioni dei New Trolls registrate in diretta", twenty minutes of digressions that aspire to be among the finest and most imaginative ever recorded in Italy.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Il Rovescio della Medaglia – Contaminazione(1973)
Rome's Il Rovescio della Medaglia were a band whose sound was closely tied to hard prog from their very beginnings, with "Bibbia" (1971) and "Io sono io" (1972), also known for their unforgettable live shows, always played at extremely high volumes thanks to a futuristic amplification rig that was unfortunately stolen from them in December 1973. Shortly before the theft, still in '73, they turned toward sounds decidedly closer to symphonic rock, bringing in composer Luis Bacalov to collaborate, here on his third experience with Italian bands. "Contaminazione", as the title makes clear, reveals a fusion of classical music and progressive rock that is also evident in the story told in the concept, that of a man who wakes up convinced he is Johann Sebastian Bach, which turns out to be the album's main influence.
(V. D'Onofrio)
The three major bands
In the history of Italian prog, many bands released significant albums, though often isolated ones or within brief careers. Three bands, however, spanned the decades, writing truly distinctive chapters. The standard-bearers of the local scene are Premiata Forneria Marconi, Banco del Mutuo Soccorso and Le Orme.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Orme – Collage (1971)
The second album by Orme, led by Aldo Tagliapietra (vocals, bass, guitars) and Tony Pagliuca (keyboards), was the record that brought Italian progressive rock to maturity: its stylistic cohesion is impressive compared to the other albums that moved in that direction in 1971, which were, incidentally,–with the exception of New Trolls' "Concerto grosso"–all released a few months later. As for cultural impact, there's really no comparison to be made: "Collage" found itself in third place on the charts within a few months, and it was the first of a long string of successes for the band, thus opening the doors for Premiata Forneria Marconi, Banco del Mutuo Soccorso, and so on.
![raccomandata_ricevuta_ritorno]( "raccomandata_ricevuta_ritorno")
Science fiction and philosophy
Among the classics in their setlist are the instrumental title track, driven by an eighteenth-century flavor complete with a nod to Domenico Scarlatti, and "Sguardo verso il cielo", a hit capable of enchanting national radio's flagship programme with epic melodies and electronic whistles produced by a waveform generator.
(F. Romagnoli)
Orme – Uomo di pezza (1972)
Aside from the obvious Mina and Battisti, "Uomo di pezza" was the real Italian record-industry phenomenon of 1972, reaching number 1 and staying in the top 10 for nine months. This success was initially driven by the fame gained over the previous year, and later by the release of the ballad "Gioco di bimba" as a single. As with "Collage", the album was produced by Gian Piero Reverberi and contains some of the standout tracks of their whole catalogue. In particular, "Figure di cartone", an airy pop-folk tune graced by an iconic synthesizer solo, and "La porta chiusa", over seven minutes of psychotic tempo shifts, distorted electric organ digressions, and lyrics with horror-movie atmospheres ("Come ogni sera sei sola nel buio, il tuo candore ti fa compagnia. Senti il fruscio sulla soglia e non sai chi sarà. Posi il giornale e ascolti in silenzio, chi sta bussando alla porta a quest'ora? Vorresti aprire e non sai come mai"). Cover artwork by Mac Mazzieri.
(F. Romagnoli)
Orme – Felona e Sorona(1973)
After the triumph of "Uomo di pezza", Tagliapietra and Pagliuca decide to release a concept album, as was fashionable in those years. They weave together the story of "Felona e Sorona", opposite and complementary planets: the happiness of one corresponds to tragedy for the other, and vice versa, depending on the period, in a constant cycle destined to fade out only at the end of time, with a return to nothingness.
The songs flow into one another without pause, and the atmospheres are agonizing, amid Bach-like organs, unruly synthesizers, dramatic staccato passages, martial rhythm sections, and piano flourishes that recall the most intimate pages of Romanticism. Tagliapietra's voice, high-pitched and unsteady, seems to grope its way through the darkness. The opening "Sospesi nell'incredibile", clocking in at nearly nine minutes, is the longest track the band had recorded up to that point. A less convincing English-language version of the album was recorded, curated by Peter Hammill, without altering the instrumental backing tracks.
(F. Romagnoli)
Premiata Forneria Marconi – Per un amico (1972)
While in Italy "Per un amico" has always been somewhat overshadowed by "Storia di un minuto", internationally, has instead established itself as the quintessential Premiata Forneria Marconi album. Just look at databases like Progarchives or Sputnikmusic, or even the lists put together by Rolling Stone (the American one), to notice a fairly clear trend. The reason isn't hard to figure out: in Italy, "Storia di un minuto" remains the album that introduced the Moog to the general public, but in English-speaking countries the instrument had arrived much earlier, so it's only natural that they'd be more struck by "Per un amico", which shows a stronger personality, freeing itself from the heavy influence of King Crimson and Jethro Tull. It thus opens up a world of its own, somewhere between renaissance ("Appena un po'"), impossible rhythms ("Generale") and ballads with electronic digressions ("Il banchetto"), capable of impressing none other than Greg Lake, who would soon become an active supporter of the band.
(F. Romagnoli)
Premiata Forneria Marconi – L'isola di niente (1974)
The third album of original material by Premiata Forneria Marconi, "L'isola di niente" sees the lineup reshuffled for the first of many times, with Patrick Djivas on bass in place of Giorgio Piazza. The title track opens with two minutes of operatic choirs, before launching into a long-driving surge, with Franco Mussida's guitar harder than it had ever been before and Franz Di Cioccio's drums grinding out odd-time rhythms. Flavio Premoli's keyboards embroider epic, baroque textures ("La luna nuova"), while it falls to Mauro Pagani to add further shades of color with violin and flute (the ballad "Dolcissima Maria"). Multi-instrumentalist and arranger Claudio Fabi once again supports the band behind the mixing desk, and the production reaches levels of excellence. "The World Became The World", released that same year, is essentially the English-language version of the album (the band had indeed built up a fair cult following in the American market, particularly thanks to their live prowess).
(F. Romagnoli)
Banco del Mutuo Soccorso – Banco del mutuo soccorso (1972)
I Banco del Mutuo Soccorso represented for Italian prog what King Crimson represented for English prog: a model to be looked at with reverential awe and one of the high points of the domestic scene. Many albums, many of them top-tier, among which their first three works stand out, the ones that launched them into the realm of European symphonic rock. Marked by the personality of singer and lyricist Francesco Di Giacomo, author of committed and poetic lyrics, and by the technique of keyboardist Vittorio Nocenzi, they stand out from their very 1972 debut, which became (also thanks to the iconic piggy-bank cover art) a classic of Italian rock. In keeping with the struggles of their generation, the album's central theme is anti-militarism: "R.I.P." is a pacifist anthem against the madness of war, with fast rhythms and raw, direct lyrics. "Metamorfosi", a typically prog instrumental, and the suite "Il giardino del mago" put them a step ahead of the average Italian band.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Just a few months after their debut, Banco tackle a complex and ambitious concept centered on evolution. It's a journey that runs from the birth of the Earth to the formation of the atmosphere, from the primordial stages of "inapparent life" to the first complex life forms which – starting from a common ancestor – will evolve all the way to man. The sense of toil weighs heavy, an evolution made of suffering, adaptation to shifting environmental conditions, random genetic mutations and death.
From "La conquista della posizione eretta" to the earliest experiments in socialization ("Cento mani e cento occhi"), forever caught in the tension between two opposing instincts (individual freedom and the need for community), through to two of the most "evolved" feelings: on one hand love ("750.000 anni fa... l'amore?"), on the other the fear of what comes after life and the plea for more time ("Miserere alla storia"), all the way to extinction ("Ed ora io domando tempo al tempo ed egli mi risponde... non ne ho!").
(V. D'Onofrio)
Banco del Mutuo Soccorso – Io sono nato libero(1973)
Having focused on anti-militarism and evolutionism, Banco quickly find the ideas for a third work, this time dedicated to individual and political freedom. As usual the result is spectacular, starting with the opening track, "Canto nomade per un prigioniero politico", a monumental showcase for Nocenzi, with Di Giacomo's lyrics as harrowing and, once again, as relevant as ever. Dedicated to Augusto Pinochet's coup against Salvador Allende, which took place in Chile in 1973, it's a moving anthem to freedom.
![alphataurus]( "alphataurus")
Religion and Morality
Between jazzy piano passages and moments wandering between Emerson and Fripp, the album continues with other tracks such as "La città sottile", the light-footed "Non mi rompete", and the long antiwar monologue with piano and synth, "Dopo niente è più lo stesso".
(V. D'Onofrio)
Mediterranean Prog
One of the defining traits of Italian progressive rock was that it spread across the whole country, with certain areas playing a particularly important role (Rome, Milan, Genoa, Naples). A significant part was played by that strand of Italian prog marked by pastoral atmospheres and/or Mediterranean folk influences, which carried features quite distinct from the rest of European prog. Among these bands, a leading role was certainly played by Lino Vairetti's group, Osanna, especially with "Palepoli". Close to Osanna (including in a family sense), but with a sound leaning more towards Van der Graaf Generator, are Cervello.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Cervello – Melos(1973)
Neapolitan progressive rock represented an important and distinctive chapter in Italy's varied scene. Within this school, Cervello belong to the more experimental strand, the one less practiced and perhaps less loved in Italy. They released just one album, "Melos", in 1973, before breaking up shortly after, discouraged by the modest audience response. Still, the band deserves great credit for representing one of the most original expressions of Italy's musical underground, one tied much more closely than others to the existentialist sound of Van Der Graaf Generator.
The Mediterranean atmosphere and ethnic sonorities already present in Osanna become harsher, thornier and more unsettling here, especially on the opening track, "Il canto del capro", whose intro is dark and anguished, particularly the acidic arpeggio from Corrado Rustici (brother of Osanna's Danilo). Worth noting are the various references to Greek philosophy, which plays such a large part in the culture of southern Italy.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Osanna – Palepoli(1973)
The third Osanna album is made up of two long tracks (plus a brief interlude, "Stanza città", which doesn't even reach a couple of minutes). It's not easy to find a way into it, since both "Oro caldo", on side one, and "Animale senza respiro", on side two, are essentially collages that put technical display and the pursuit of surprise ahead of compositional rigor: the themes almost never recur more than once and are often elusive, built out of riffs or harmonies, rather than actual melodies.
Aside from the famous refrain "Fuje 'a chistu paese" near the start of "Oro caldo", there's very little that's catchy here, while the cauldron rapidly fills with jazz-rock rhythmic interplay, avant-folk breaks that deconstruct the past of beloved Naples, and unexpected blues gallops. The combination of Mediterranean touches with the songs' unusual structure has made it a cult object, still sought after today by the most hardcore prog collectors.
(F. Romagnoli)
Quella Vecchia Locanda – Il tempo della gioia (1974)
Only two albums to their name for Rome's Quella Vecchia Locanda, but both are icons of Italian progressive rock, with memorable cover art. It's hard to choose between their self-titled 1972 debut, which already showed great potential, excellent technique, a close bond with classical music and an affinity with bands like Gentle Giant and Jethro Tull, and the following "Il tempo della gioia", from 1974. The choice falls on the latter due to the band's greater maturity and ambition, recording an LP full of virtuosic flourishes and sonic explorations that lean toward a tighter fusion of classical and symphonic rock. The use of violin is overflowing and gives the band a distinctly original quality compared to their peers. Worth noting above all is the title track and the two long tracks, "Un giorno, un amico" and "È accaduto una notte", along with the baroque "A forma di". Two instrumentals –"Un giorno" and "Un amico" –place them at decidedly high compositional levels within the Italian scene.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Maxophone – Maxophone (1975)The Milanese band Maxophone followed in the footsteps of two of the fundamental names of British prog, Yes and Genesis, more closely than most. The cover art alone betrays the Yes influence, but Alberto Ravasini's vocal harmonies and Sergio Lattuada's keyboards also recall Jon Anderson's band in more than one respect. While the approach here is more international than distinctly Italian, the record is not without originality, the product of a six-piece lineup with an expanded instrumental palette (clarinet, flute, sax, French horn, trumpet, vibraphone) and moments of lightness and joy.
The musicians' academic training is evident in the more complex tracks ("Fase"), in the most ambitious piece ("Antiche conclusioni negre") and in the classical-music ties of "Mercanti di pazzie". "Maxophone" is an example of late Italian prog, born at what can by now be called the tail end of the great flood of the previous three years. The album was recorded in two versions: Italian and English.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Celeste – Celeste(1976)
Recorded between 1974 and 1975, the debut album by Celeste, from Sanremo, wasn't released until January 1976, and passed almost unnoticed. The band didn't even get the chance to finish the sessions for their follow-up, splitting up due to unspecified internal conflicts (an incomplete "Celeste II" would nonetheless see the light some fifteen years later). Rediscovery came in the Eighties, thanks to the usual, invaluable series of reissues on the Japanese market.
This is an atypical work, with an acoustic feel despite the extensive use of keyboards (Mellotron in particular, but also some synthesizer touches), with virtually no trace of electric guitars. The pastoral atmospheres and lyrics, celebrating a distant Arcadia, blend well with the use of flutes, saxophones, spinet, xylophone, percussion and gentle vocal harmonies. In some reissues the album was retitled "Principe di un giorno", after the opening track.
(F. Romagnoli)
In the name of Emerson Lake & Palmer
It's no exaggeration to say that Emerson Lake & Palmer were one of the bands with the greatest influence on the Italian scene. Perhaps even the single most influential of all, judging by Latte e Miele, with their reworkings of baroque, classical and romantic music, but above all by Metamorfosi, who in 1973 recorded the first chapter of their Dante-inspired trilogy, "Inferno".
(V. D'Onofrio)
Latte e Miele – Papillon(1973)
The Genoese band Latte e Miele were among the acts most closely tied to the ELP sound to emerge in Italy. With three albums to their name, the second is certainly their most significant legacy. Almost obsessively influenced by classical music, they devote the entire B-side of the vinyl to it (Beethoven's "Piano Sonata No. 8", the third movement of Tchaikovsky's "Symphony No. 6" and reworkings of Vivaldi-esque compositions). Side A, the one that places them within the progressive scene, is an utterly Emerson-esque concept album, telling the story of a puppet condemned to death for falling in love with a little girl. This dark fable, a hymn to individual freedom descended from "Pinocchio" and the masks of Pierrot and Petrushka (the puppet from Stravinsky's opera of the same name), displays excellent technical skill, evident in the overture and the seven distinct movements. The ties to the prog fairy tales of Genesis are also clear.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Metamorfosi – Inferno(1973)
Among the many musicians who have sought to grapple with the monument of Italian literature, Dante's "Divina Commedia", a prog band of that historical era was certain to take up the challenge. Rome's Metamorfosi devoted an entire career to this undertaking, starting in 1973 with "Inferno", one of the gems of the Italian prog discography. Buoyed by the powerful voice of Jimmy Spitaleri, but above all by the phenomenal keyboardist Enrico Olivieri, Metamorfosi stood as a shining example of rock influenced by the hyper-technical experience of Emerson Lake & Palmer.
Several tracks stand out, from the instrumental "Introduzione", to the perfect depiction of "Caronte", all the way to the circles of hell updated to 1970s Italy ("Spacciatori di droga"), with references to the Ku Klux Klan ("Razzisti") and, above all, in the epic finale, to "Lucifero", a superb example of how technique can be reconciled with poetry and inspiration.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Anti-imperialist prog
In an era of grand ideologies, it was hard to take a stand without being branded as apolitical or wishy-washy. Italian prog is marked by several strikingly antimilitarist works. Area must be considered the most politicized band of the scene, representative of the traits (and idiosyncrasies) of anarchist and far-left movements: capable of imagining a world wholly alternative to the existing one dominated by capitalism, and outspoken supporters of the Palestinian cause.
(V. D'Onofrio)
(1973)
Area were among the most iconoclastic and subversive bands of the period we're covering here. Even in this debut, they display an ability and ambition that put them well above the average, to the point of being nearly impossible to pin to a single scene, thanks to their knack for ranging across multiple genres and creating new, unrepeatable sonic worlds steeped in Middle Eastern flavors. The title, which echoes the grim motto that loomed over the gates of Nazi concentration camps, underscores the political charge of an album that unquestionably belongs to the militant rock in opposition movement. It also marks the beginning of the artistic story of Demetrio Stratos, who died tragically young, gifted with a voice whose range and power remained out of reach for most singers of the scene.
Its classics are too many to count: "Luglio, agosto, settembre (nero)", "Consapevolezza", "240 chilometri da Smirne", "L'abbattimento dello Zeppelin" — blends of jazz, avant-garde, kraut and rock in opposition.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Area – Caution Radiation Area (1974)
After "Arbeit Macht Frei" it wasn't easy to top themselves, but Area manage it, raising the stakes with a new work that pushes them even further into opposition to any form of art subservient to market rules. Venturing toward a more radical free jazz, they reduce the vocal presence of Demetrio Stratos – audible only in "Cometa Rossa" and in a small part of the dazzling "Brujo" – to devote themselves to furious instrumental pieces of almost unheard-of complexity ("ZYG Crescita Zero"). Jazz becomes predominant ("Mirage"), but is enriched with electronics, spilling over into the avant-garde experimentation of "Lobotomia", a purported requiem for men now reduced to brain-dead consumers by the dominant capitalist mindset, to which Area stand in radical opposition. An concept uncompromising and experimental album set against forbidding atomic scenarios where every notion of melody and classic song format — still partly present on the debut — is abandoned.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Campo di Marte – Campo di Marte(1973)
Campo di Marte were formed in Florence in 1971, the brainchild of Enrico Rosa, one of the scene's most technically gifted guitarists. Theirs is the only distinctly antimilitarist concept album produced by Italian prog, with poetic lyrics describing the consequences of war as it upends the landscape and the lives of men. The sound has moments of extreme harshness that bring Rosa close to a Hendrix-style guitar hero, though heavily tied to classical tradition. There's also a striking dissonance between the harshness of the sound — with a guitar that at times borders on noise ("Terzo Tempo") — and the emptiness of Rosa's voice.
"Primo tempo" is the album's most immediate track, with lyrics of real quality and a particularly aggressive bass. Fields of flowers where a child plays happily turn into graveyards, with thousands of crosses so vast and numerous they blot out the sun. Bones are the only harvest of this mad sowing. There is no just war, only madness and death.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Religion and Morality The Italian Seventies were not only the era of ideological conflicts born from the clash between capitalism and communism, but also a time when young people became aware of their own otherness in relation to the previous generation, still crushed by Catholic morality. The ideals of 1968 radically changed the landscape, and even in prog some bands described, in a very personal way, the contrast between their bourgeois upbringing and this new way of decoding reality. In such a diverse scenario, there is of course room for more than just criticism: Alphataurus, for instance, firmly defend Catholic values.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Alphataurus – Alphataurus (1973)
Released by Magma, the label run by New Trolls' Vittorio De Scalzi, the only album (setting aside the posthumous second one) by Milan's Alphataurus deserves recognition as one of the small lost gems of Italian pop of the Seventies. Blessed with enviable technical skill, the musicians take on three long tracks ("Peccato d'orgoglio", "La mente vola" and "Ombra muta") that move between Emerson-esque territory and energetic, distorted guitars. The lyrics are steeped in catechistic overtones ("Una ragione per vivere c'è. La mente volta, non ti conosci più. Ora sai cos'è, la voglia di pregare, la forza di sperare, lassù qualcuno c'è"), a trait that perhaps didn't win them much favor with the militant intelligentsia of the time. Worth noting is the fantastic antiwar gatefold cover, which unfolds into three parts showing a white dove, age-old symbol of peace, dropping bombs on a world destroyed by nuclear conflict.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Jumbo – Vietato ai minori di 18 anni? (1973)
After playing bass in Gianni Pettenati's band, Alvaro Fella founded his own group, Jumbo. Having assembled an eclectic group of musicians bordering on hard prog, with furious moments recalling Biglietto per l'Inferno, in 1973 he arrived at "Vietato ai minori di 18 anni?". Beyond being an aggressive LP with a strong blues streak, it stands out as a genuine psychoanalytic session for Fella. It's clear how, within Italy's Seventies youth movement, the question of sexual freedom mattered greatly, in a country still deeply tied to Catholic tradition. The lyrics deal with sex, masturbation, violence, loneliness and marginalization, for young people who feel crushed by an oppressive, provincial mindset. Naturally, this — together with the cover depicting a little girl trying to spy on her parents' bedroom — got it banned from all radio airplay. An alternative but essential piece of the Italian prog scene.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Semiramis – Dedicato a Frazz (1973)
The very young Semiramis entered the Italian prog scene with a single album, notable both for its beautiful gatefold cover, drawn by English artist Gordon Faggetter (then based in Rome), and for being the first band of a then sixteen-year-old Michele Zarrillo. "Dedicato a Frazz" is an excellent work, technical and complex, moving between Crimson-esque attempts and melodies recalling Genesis. Also notable is its ambition to tell the story of a psychopath named Frazz, cast out by society, who sees no way forward but suicide.
Every track is a small prog gem, from "Zoo di vetro", which evokes Tennessee Williams' play, to the Emerson-esque "Per una strada affollata", down to the mini-suite "La bottega del rigattiere". The sound engineer was Luciano Marioni, at the time orbiting the musicians of Bla Bla.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Alusa Fallax – Intorno alla mia cattiva educazione (1974)
The Milanese outfit Alusa Fallax began their short-lived career in the late Sixties as a beat band, before splitting up and reuniting in 1973, releasing their debut album "Intorno alla mia cattiva educazione" the following year. The record is an attempt at a prog opus that shows the usual affinities with classical music, while the strongest link to the British scene is with Jethro Tull and probably part of the folk revival.
Amid dynamic shifts, passages tied to popular music, and faint echoes of beat, the record unfolds across thirteen short tracks meant to be heard as a single unicum, a small symphony intended as the soundtrack to a theatrical piece. "Intorno alla mia cattiva educazione" was thus conceived as a blend of music and theater, staged live through a puppet — an emblem of a man victimized by a strict, bigoted upbringing, the limit society imposed on his own true, free expression.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Biglietto per l'Inferno – Biglietto per l'inferno (1974)
The only album released by the first incarnation of Biglietto per l'Inferno, before the various reunions, is one of the cult records of Italian progressive rock, even though it went largely unnoticed at the time. The production, moreover, was already out of step with the times: between 1973 and 1974 the whole prog scene was turning a corner, discovering polyphonic synthesizers and new recording techniques, while this album sounds like a hard rock record cut in the late Sixties, so muffled and flat is the sound.
It still manages to carve out its own space thanks to the lyrics, which highlight the inner conflicts of singer Claudio Canali (a devout Catholic, yet rather hostile to organized religion), the neurotic atmospheres seasoned with declamations and aggressive high notes (perhaps influenced by Uriah Heep), and the convulsive songwriting, dense with jolts and proto-metal surges. The occasional presence of flute has prompted comparisons with Jethro Tull, admittedly on shaky ground.
(F. Romagnoli)
Science fiction and philosophy
In the flood of ideas of the 1972-74 three-year period, a number of sci-fi-themed concept albums stand out, including the little-known gem by the Roman outfit Return Receipt Requested, the debut by Museo Rosenbach, inspired by 20th-century philosophy, and Balletto di Bronzo's "Ys", a band already tied to the theme since their debut, "Sirio 2222". Franco Falsini's album is instrumental, but can be included in this category given its affinity with the music of the German cosmic couriers.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Balletto di Bronzo – Ys (1972)
The Balletto di Bronzo of "Ys" is practically a band making its debut all over again: there's not much in common with the previous album, "Sirio 2222", released two years earlier. Between the two records the lineup had reshuffled, with the departure of singer Marco Cecioni and bassist Michele Cupaiolo, and the arrival of Gianni Leone (vocals, keyboards). Leone brought about a drastic change in sound, writing all the new material himself (whereas "Sirio 2222" had been penned by writers outside the band), and leaving behind the beat and hard-blues residue. The new path unfolds through frenzied rhythmic breaks, a heavy use of odd time signatures, an assortment of analog keyboards (Moog, Mellotron, electric organ), fuzz-drenched guitars, and Leone's hysterical voice narrating the story of the last man.
Quickly forgotten despite being released on Polydor, the album would be gradually rediscovered starting in the late Eighties, thanks to a series of Japanese reissues.
(F. Romagnoli)
Return Receipt Requested – Per… un mondo di cristallo (1972)
The story of the Roman band Return Receipt Requested is one of those that leaves Italian prog fans with a bitter taste. Just one album, released in 1972, has become a cult object, as well as one of the finest examples of concept album with a sci-fi/dystopian theme. The album's greatness lies in several factors: the post-apocalyptic plot that tells a story full of food for thought, the obsessive, repetitive rhythms found in nearly every track, the echoes of Arthur Brown and of the Bowie of "The Man Who Sold The World" and "Hunky Dory", the very strong influence of jazz, and the sense of desolation, which precisely depicts the story of an astronaut who returns to Earth after several years, finding a world destroyed by nuclear conflict. The long trek through desolate wastelands continues obsessively until the encounter with the few unhappy survivors, described in the suite "Un palco di marionette", by now reduced to slaves by a great puppeteer who controls them from above.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Museo Rosenbach – Zarathustra(1973)
The Ligurian band Museo Rosenbach created one of the most beloved albums among Italian prog fans. Due to a certain naivety, combined with the excessive politicization of the Seventies, they were opposed over a supposed right-wing ideology, which they always denied. But the reference to Nietzsche's "Zarathustra" and the image of Mussolini in the cover collage were enough to make any radio airplay difficult and to severely limit the availability of venues for live performances. Hence the split and the resulting obscurity.
The album, on the other hand, is spectacular, boasting one of the best voices in Italian music (singer "Lupo" Galifi) and the excellent keyboardist Pit Corradi. "Zarathustra" – split into five parts full of highs and lows, accelerations and decelerations – aspires to be one of the finest Italian progressive suites. Even in the shorter tracks, like "Degli uomini", "Della natura" and "Dell'eterno ritorno", the music is a celebration of the finest prog that Europe was producing in those years.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Franco Falsini – Cold Nose (Naso freddo) (1975)
Having put Sensations' Fix on temporary hold, a band he would reactivate the following year, Florence's Franco Falsini indulged in his only solo effort. Aside from the absence of the band's other members, the setup remains unchanged: production by the ever-faithful Filippo Milani and release on Polydor (at a time when even the biggest labels cultivated an interest in experimental music). The absence of bass and drums paradoxically benefits the arrangements, which come across as more evocative and clear-cut than on any Sensations' Fix record. Falsini plays everything himself, blending guitars and electronic keyboards into a grand fresco of cosmic music that simultaneously rivals the Tangerine Dream of "Rubycon" and the Manuel Göttsching of “Inventions For Electric Guitar”, without arriving late to the appointment, either (both mentioned works came out that same year). It's said that Milani also shot a short film titled “Cold Nose”, which remains untraceable to this day.
(F. Romagnoli)
A Study in Folklore
The records by projects such as Aktuala and Canzoniere del Lazio actually sit at the borders of Italian prog, constantly risking stepping outside it due to strong avant-folk influences and the absence of electric instruments. Although the doubt remains, we chose to include them both because they'd be hard to place in any context other than this one, and because both would later align more closely with the dictates of more classically understood prog. This is especially true of the latter, whose "Miradas" (1977) is perhaps a touch overrated compared to the originality of their earlier work.
(F. Romagnoli)
Aktuala – Aktuala (1973)
Milan's Aktuala, led by Walter Maioli (flute and oboe), have little to do with classic progressive rock, but they're part of the progressive/folk/ethnic scene that had in the Third Ear Band as its main reference point. Hired by the Bla Bla label, the same one behind the experimental albums of Franco Battiato (their main sponsor), they put forward a project with an ambivalence similar to that of the Third Ear Band: experimental and innovative, yet at the same time tied to tradition. The main influence was Indian music. The band included percussionist Lino Capra Vaccina, who five years later would release one of the key LPs of Italian minimalism, “Antico adagio”. Maioli continued his noble research in his subsequent work with Aktuala (“La terra” in 1974, “Tappeto volante” in 1976), and in 1990 he collaborated with Milan's Natural History Museum on a study of prehistoric music.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Canzoniere del Lazio – Lassa stà la me creatura (1974)
A sensational work of anthropological research, it draws on a handful of folk songs from central-southern Italy, reworking and expanding them. Along the way come pagan tarantellas meant to exorcise the tarantula's venom (“Antidoto”), two-voice chants with organetto and bell improvisations (“'Ncominciai a non avé più bene in vita mia”), ancient rituals with drums and saxophones imitating bagpipes (“Processione”), funeral processions with epic choruses and violin solos (“Lu povero Antonuccio”), and harvest songs that veer into avant-garde jazz territory (“Canti a mete di Barbarano”).
While showing awareness of the most recent intelligentsia of Italian and international music, the record turns out to be surprisingly respectful of its sources, never losing sight, even for a moment, of the age-old charm of our folklore. All the songs were recorded live in the studio, under the watchful supervision of an unlikely Ricky Gianco. Reissued in SACD edition in March 2018.
(F. Romagnoli)
On the Border with Jazz The fusion of jazz and prog took shape in two main forms: the Canterbury school and the guitar-driven jazz-rock of the Mahavishnu Orchestra, both more or less bordering on the jazz fusion being created in the same period by the circle around Miles Davis, Joe Zawinul and Herbie Hancock. In Italy, these different schools gave rise to one of the most distinctive chapters of European prog. The most Canterbury-esque band — so much so that they dedicated their album to a fictitious alter ego of Robert Wyatt (Roberto Viatti) — are without doubt the Ligurian outfit Picchio dal Pozzo, while on the other front the standout act is Perigeo, who even managed to chart repeatedly around the mid-Seventies. Finally, the powerful Neapolitan funk of James Senese's Napoli Centrale stands entirely on its own.
(F. Romagnoli)
Dedalus – Dedalus (1973)
Initially rejected by their own label, Dedalus's work stands as a singular case within the Italian scene. Released in 1973, this LP perfectly captures the experimental drive of jazz, in a manner not too dissimilar from what the Soft Machine or our own Perigeo were doing at the time. The guitar contributions of Marco Di Castri (guitar, sax) and cellist Fiorenzo Michele Bonansone give rise to five instrumental tracks in perfect balance with the rhythm section of Furio Di Castri (bass) and Enrico Grosso (drums).
Featuring Aktuala percussionist René Mantegna, the album opens with “Santiago,” a jazz fusion number with a distorted organ that veers straight toward Canterbury, offering a delicious preview of the thunderous cello, which harks back to the scene's more mystical leanings. The strongest track on the record is “CT6,” fourteen minutes in which every musician gets to make their contribution without ever overplaying.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Perigeo – Abbiamo tutti un blues da piangere(1973)
The Roman Perigeo were perhaps the best instrumental progressive rock group in Italy. “Abbiamo tutti un blues da piangere” is their second album, probably their most eclectic. Led by bassist Giovanni Tommaso, who even allows himself a few lines of unintelligible vocals on the opening “Non c'è tempo da perdere”, the band's strength lies in its jazz themes and the technical skill of its members: Franco D'Andrea moves effortlessly between classical piano and Fender Rhodes, Bruno Biriaco's drumming knows how to balance silence with chaotic bursts, while guitarist Tony Sidney places a handful of electric solos exactly where they're needed, preferring acoustic embellishments elsewhere. Claudio Fasoli's saxophones lend just the right epic touch to the underlying interplay.
It's precisely the frequent use of acoustic instruments that makes the album atypical for an era in which jazz-rock was pushing toward blazing guitar workouts (Mahavishnu Orchestra) and jazz fusion toward electronics (Herbie Hancock).
(F. Romagnoli)
Arti & Mestieri – Tilt (Immagini per un orecchio) (1974)
A Piedmontese combo still active today, led by drummer Furio Chirico, the Arti & Mestieri were formed in 1973 and managed to play at the Parco Lambro festival the following year, catching the attention of Gianni Sassi, who signed them to his Cramps Records. Their debut album soon followed, a cult record of Italian progressive rock closely tied to jazz-rock. The material is predominantly instrumental, save for a few sporadic vocal lines from violinist Giovanni Vigliar, and more or less every member carves out space to shine, without ever losing sight of their role within the overall texture. Keyboardist Beppe Crovella occasionally turns to the Mellotron, an unusual instrument in jazz-rock circles given its poor suitability for virtuosic playing. The songwriting isn't always sharply focused and the tracklist ends up feeling a touch too homogeneous, but the members' technical mastery is beyond question, and the praise they've received is, all things considered, understandable. Produced by Paolo Tofani of Area.
(F. Romagnoli)
Napoli Centrale – Napoli Centrale (1975)
Singer and saxophonist James Senese, son of an Italian mother and an African-American soldier, is one of the best-known instrumentalists of the thriving Neapolitan scene of the Seventies. Napoli Centrale is the project that, over the years, has played a central role in his artistic career (though he never abandoned his session work for Pino Daniele). Founded in 1975, the band featured drummer Franco Del Prete and two transplanted Americans: Mark Harris (keyboards) and Tony Walmsley (bass). Their self-titled debut album is an overwhelming j'accuse, a blend of prog, jazz fusion and funk, with lyrics addressing the problems that have always afflicted the South: exploitation, poverty, depopulation. Senese's roaring voice, his tireless sax work, the rhythm section's convulsive grooves, keyboards flowing liquid amid the general tumult, and at least four genuine classics: “Campagna,” “'A gente e' Bucciano,” “Viecchie, mugliere, muorte e criaturi” and “Vico Primo Parise n. 8.”
(F. Romagnoli)
Roberto Colombo – Sfogatevi bestie(1976)
Among the most significant albums influenced by Canterbury-style jazz-rock and by the jazz fusion of Miles Davis are certainly the early LPs of Milanese musician Roberto Colombo. A versatile artist, in his early years he produced at least two works – "Sfogatevi bestie" (1976) and "Botte da orbi" (1977) ––that stand as an emblematic case of music straddling jazz and prog, of great complexity, heavily influenced by the irony and the more mature freak rock of Frank Zappa, as well as by the maximalist jazz of theCanterbury Centipede. There's no shortage of cinematic moments recalling certain soundtracks from great Italian genre cinema. The strength of the record lies in finding a perfect junction between technique and lightheartedness, between culture and irony, a goal that is often an unattainable chimera. In this respect, among the high points worth noting are the whirling ten minutes quoting Zappa-esque from "Caccia alla volpe".
(V. D'Onofrio)
Aldo De Scalzi, brother of New Trolls' Vittorio, is today one of the most sought-after composers of soundtracks for Italian television. In a distant past, he was the founder of Grog Records, remembered above all for distributing the albums of Celeste and Picchio Dal Pozzo. It was in the latter that De Scalzi himself played keyboards, alongside Andrea Beccari (bass, horn), Paolo Griguolo (guitar) and Giorgio Karaghiosoff (winds). Picchio dal Pozzo's self-titled debut album arrived very late, when the Italian prog scene was already on its last legs, and despite some obvious nods to the Canterbury scene, it stands out for its eccentricity and recording quality, with a technological sound evoking boundless spaces. The two longest tracks stand out in particular, “Seppia” (with its murky synthesizer grooves and the ancestral call of the horn) and “Napier” (a swarm of flutes, sax, percussion and electronic flourishes). Vocal parts are few, often nursery-rhyme-like.
(F. Romagnoli)
Horror Cinema
Goblin essentially stand in a category of their own, being a band inextricably tied to horror film soundtracks, the very reason for their existence. Proof of this lies in the fact that the material they released independently, unconnected to film scores, went almost entirely unnoticed. One small curiosity: under the direction of Enrico Simonetti, the band also scored “Gamma,” a landmark Italian science-fiction TV serial that aired for four episodes starting in October 1975.
(F. Romagnoli)
Goblin – Profondo rosso (1975)
“Profondo rosso" wasn't just a huge box-office success, and it wasn't just the film that plausibly gave birth to the modern concept of horror, with its systematic pursuit of the so-called jumpscare. It was also the launching pad for a talented band, which would go down in history for its partnership with the films of Dario Argento, as well as for the quality of its music, traceable, at least in the early part of its career, to the world of progressive rock. The vinyl containing the film's score, released by Cinevox, entered the charts in May 1975 and climbed to number two, while the 7-inch single of the famous main theme hit number 1 and stayed there for four weeks. It's music that still sounds unsettling today, with its use of obsessive bass lines (influenced by Mike Oldfield from "Tubular Bells"), but also strongly original, especially for the drum bursts, close to jazz avant-garde, and the extensive use of dissonance.
(F. Romagnoli)
Radio-friendly pop The flirtation between Italian pop music and progressive rock was constant, in both directions: from Alunni del Sole, whose romantic and somewhat syrupy music nonetheless often ventured into typically prog textures, to New Trolls, who, once the season of big concerts and experimentation was over, turned to the nostalgic pop of "Aldebaran", by way of Dik Dik, former standard-bearers of Italian beat, who in 1972 released "Suite per una donna assolutamente relativa". Representing this middle ground, we've chosen Pooh, perhaps never truly progressive, but influenced by that world quite noticeably for several years.(F. Romagnoli)
Pooh – Un po' del nostro tempo migliore (1975)
From 1971's "Opera prima" to 1981's "Buona fortuna", Pooh released at least one album a year, with the sole exception of the eighteen months separating "Parsifal" from "Un po' del nostro tempo migliore". It's no surprise that the long break allowed them to raise the bar of their ambition and release their most mature album to date. Continuing on from "Parsifal", they craft an orchestral, majestic pop sound with clear progressive leanings, always kept on a tight leash, staying within the bounds of the song form and radio-friendly appeal: a bit like the Moody Blues without the experimental interludes. The result is convincing enough to forgive the excesses of "Il tempo, una donna, la città" and the shameless lift of the introduction to "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" by Beatles in "Eleonora mia madre". Standouts include the instrumental "Mediterraneo", the philosophical ballad "Oceano", and the martial "1966", marked by remarkable guitar virtuosity.
(F. Romagnoli)
The soloists
As mentioned in the general introduction, solo singers' careers aren't particularly well suited to the world of progressive rock, and it's no coincidence that almost any list on the subject is made up almost entirely of bands. Even so, many artists tried the experiment, exploring that world for one or two albums before returning (or entering it for the first time, as in the case of Alan Sorrenti) to a more conventional career in line with the standards of the pop song. The most commercially striking case was obviously that of Lucio Battisti, but Franco Battiato also achieved good results, breaking into the top 10 with "Pollution" in March 1973.
(F. Romagnoli)
Claudio Rocchi – Magic Flight No. 1 (1971)
Claudio Rocchi was only eighteen when he made his album debut as a member of Stormy Six in 1969, with "Le idee di oggi per la musica di domani". He left the band almost immediately, distancing himself from that already-dated beat music. In 1970, thanks to producer Alberto Salerno's interest, he released his first solo work, "Viaggio", recorded together with Mauro Pagani. The real coup - at least among insiders - came a year later, however, with "Magic Flight No. 1". The first side of the vinyl is taken up entirely by a progressive folk suite, with a very long acoustic introduction marked by percussion and ethereal choirs, while the grand finale is a triumph of distorted, cathartic rock (young Italian-Brazilian guitarist Alberto Camerini takes part).
On the second side stands out the mystical-philosophical gem "La realtà non esiste", two and a half minutes for piano and voice alone. Franco Battiato would revisit it more than forty years later.
(F. Romagnoli)
Franco Battiato – Fetus (1972)
Franco Battiato burst onto the Italian experimental music scene like a bolt from the blue. Although the artist himself later looked back on his early albums with some suspicion, implicitly accusing them of being marred by the naivety of an era that faded quickly, the four titles released between 1972 and 1974 still sound solid today (if anything, it's the 1975-1978 albums, devoted to the most uncompromising avant-garde, that come across as overreaching). "Fetus", his debut, is perhaps the most direct work of pre-pop-turn Battiato, and not by chance does it already show distant hints of what was to come ("Una cellula"). The star of most of the tracklist is the Vcs3 synthesizer, splitting its time between atmospheric passages ("Energia") and violent walls of sound (the title track), slipping now into pieces close to classic progressive rock, now into collages of manipulated tape and found sounds. It's well known, after all, that Battiato was influenced by Karlheinz Stockhausen during that period.
(F. Romagnoli)
Alan Sorrenti – Aria (1972)
A legendary album for Italian progressive rock, and in retrospect almost counterproductive to the critical standing of Alan Sorrenti's subsequent work, often accused of having sold out to disco music and more facile pop toward the end of the Seventies (not that this troubled his bank balance much). Controversies that, however saccharine "Tu sei l’unica donna per me" may sound today, now appear rather reactionary. Recorded by a twenty-one-year-old Sorrenti, "Aria" is structured like Rocchi's "Magic Flight No. 1": one long suite on the first side, and three more or less stretched-out songs on the second. Its sacred aura comes mainly from the nearly twenty minutes of the title track, a vocal exploration of high notes and impossible variations enough to make Tim Buckley and Peter Hammill tremble, with the magic violin of Zappa associate Jean-Luc Ponty guiding a solid progressive folk arrangement. Drums and percussion courtesy of Tony Esposito. (F. Romagnoli)
Lucio Battisti had already dipped into progressive rock in 1971 with "Amore e non amore" and again in 1973 with "Il nostro caro angelo", but it's only with "Anima latina" that he fully enters that world. An album with an experimental approach, it brought the first serious cracks in the relationship between Battisti and Mogol, due to the vocals being mixed at low volume or heavily processed with effects, making the lyrics hard to make out. The fact that it didn't produce songs that stuck in the collective memory has fed the false myth of poor commercial performance, but in reality the LP stayed at number one on the charts for fourteen weeks straight. Today, most critics consider it Battisti's best album, rivaled only by "Don Giovanni" from his period alongside Pasquale Panella. A fully deserved reputation, thanks to complex songs graced by a production remarkably advanced for its time, full of odd time signatures, Latin influences and paranoid synthesizers.
(F. Romagnoli)
The song that closes Franco Battiato's career, "Torneremo ancora", written together with Juri Camisasca, was released not long ago. It closed a circle forty-five years in the making, since it was Battiato himself who produced Camisasca's debut album back in 1974. A percussive avant-folk record, progressive perhaps more in the timbre of its instruments than in its song structures, "La finestra dentro" falls within the current shared by Rocchi and early Sorrenti, but with a distinctly more diseased approach. Where Rocchi's main element was hope and Sorrenti was steeped in melancholy, Camisasca sings of rotting, crumbling men who lose control of their bodies and their grip on reality ("Un galantuomo"), when they don't outright turn into Kafkaesque monsters ("Metamorfosi"). Yet, like Rocchi before him, Camisasca too manages to land a poignant piano ballad reflecting on the human condition: "Ho un grande vuoto nella testa".
(F. Romagnoli)
1977 – Curtain Call
The swan song of classic Italian prog can be dated to 1977. A year that, in any case, gave us iconic albums of the movement, such as "L’apprendista" by Stormy Six, a band symbolic of the shift in perspective then underway (their explorations would culminate three years later with "Macchina maccheronica"), "Gudrun" by Pierrot Lunaire, with its strong ties to avant-garde music, and the debut of Locanda delle Fate ("Forse le lucciole non si amano più"), probably the last chapter in the story of Italian symphonic rock.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Locanda delle Fate – Forse le lucciole non si amano più (1977)
The sole album by Locanda delle Fate is considered by many to be the swan song of Italian progressive rock, having come out in the summer of 1977, by which point only giants like Orme, Pfm and Banco could still make a dent in the record market, albeit offering sounds less forbidding than in the past. Its reputation as a work that passed unnoticed, with an attendant commercial flop and the band's swift breakup, doesn't hold up: the album came out on Polydor and got a decent amount of publicity, including appearances on Rai television, reaching number 25 on the weekly "TV Sorrisi e Canzoni" chart (not bad at all, considering that historic names like Area and Napoli Centrale never hit such a mark). The tracklist features seven pieces of grandiose symphonic rock, driven by the polished flow of Michele Conta's keyboards. Less thrilling are Leonardo Sasso's raspy voice and symbolist lyrics, though they still do their job in keeping the machine running smoothly.
(F. Romagnoli)
Pierrot Lunaire – Gudrun (1977)
In the year of Italian prog's swan song, the Rome-based band led by Arturo Staltieri released their second album. After a solid 1974 debut, it was time for "Gudrun". The band's ambition led them to radically move beyond typical prog territory to embrace references to 20th-century classical and avant-garde music, as already suggested by the band's name (a nod to Arnold Schönberg) and the album's title (a nod to Richard Wagner). Where prog does appear, it's in the more dynamic passages that stitch together the various lyrical moments, the minimalist repetitions à-la Terry Riley, and the bold eighteenth-century references ("Plaisir d’amour"). Between experimental collages and a mix of electronics and operatic music, "Gudrun" represents an endpoint for an Italian prog that had by then gone beyond itself, in search of new paths to explore.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Stormy Six – L’apprendista (1977)
Our journey, which began in 1970, can be considered concluded in 1977, a year of changes and reinventions. Who better to close it than the legendary Stormy Six, members of the Rock in Opposition movement and co-signatories of Chris Cutler's manifesto? Their entire career has been one continuous reinvention, moving from beat and psychedelic beginnings with a young Claudio Rocchi to becoming symbols of the blending of different genres, from folk to progressive complexity. A path already begun in previous years with "Un biglietto del tram" (1975), it reaches a culmination in "L’apprendista". It's a work of thorough renewal, thanks to the brilliant experimenters Tommaso Leddi and Franco Fabbri, elaborating on experiences born from their dealings with RIO bands and Italian political song. A new path that closes one season of freedom while trying to open another, passing on a torch that few will be able to carry forward.
(V. D'Onofrio)
The Minor OnesA quick look at the bands that managed to catch the attention of genre fans, but aren't as significant as those already covered, or at least not entirely relevant to the prog universe. Take, for instance, the Ligurian band Garybaldi, led by the most famous Italian guitar hero of the era, Bambi Fossati, authors of two albums ("Nuda" from 1972 and "Astrolabio" from 1973), heavily indebted to the psychedelic hard blues of Jimi Hendrix. Worth noting is the iconic cover of "Nuda", designed by a very young Crepax. Closer to cosmic krautrock were Albergo Intergalattico Spaziale, with their self-titled 1978 album, or the Telaio Magnetico project by Lino Capra Vaccina, Franco Battiato, Juri Camisasca and Mino Di Martino ("Live '75"). Close to the hippie world, starting from the cover art, were the Italian-German act Analogy ("Analogy", 1972), as well as the Living Music project, inspired by the ideas and books of Allen Ginsberg ("To Allen Ginsberg", 1972). Closer to classic prog were the Roman band Buon Vecchio Charlie, in whose lineup a young Richard Benson played.
Other albums up for discussion include “Uno” (1971) by Panna Fredda, the self-titled 1974 album by Saint Just, the band led by Jenny Sorrenti, “Topi o uomini” (1972) by the Sicilian band Flea, “Io non so da dove vengo e non so dove mai andrò. Uomo è il nome che mi han dato” (1972) by Milan's De De Lind, and “Generazioni” (1975) by Edgar Allan Poe, inspired by the American poet. Those seeking the avant-garde-leaning side of prog will likely appreciate “Introspezione” (1974) by Opus Avantra or “Concerto delle menti” (1972) by Pholas Dactylus.
(V. D'Onofrio)
The Covers
One of the traits of progressive rock, likely inherited from jazz and psychedelic music, was treating the vinyl record as a work of art in its own right, not merely a container for music. The idea of the cover as artwork found a decisive development in prog (the covers of Yes or King Crimson above all). This phenomenon also developed in Italy, reaching its peak with some gatefold covers that opened into two, sometimes even three panels. Here are some of the most representative examples, although they don't necessarily come from albums included in our selection.
(V. D'Onofrio)
Garybaldi – Nuda (1972)
Orme – Uomo di pezza (1972)
Quella Vecchia Locanda – Quella vecchia locanda (1972)
Trip – Atlantide (1972)
Alphataurus – Alphataurus (1973)
Metamorfosi – Inferno (1973)
Orme – Felona e Sorona (1973)
Return Receipt Requested – Per… un mondo di cristallo (1973)
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01/03/2026
Progressive on OndaRock
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Discography
I cinquanta dischi
Trip - The Trip (1970)
Giganti - Terra in bocca (1971)
New Trolls - Concerto grosso per i New Trolls (1971)
Orme - Collage (1971)
Osanna - L’uomo (1971)
Claudio Rocchi - Volo Magico n.1 (1971)
Balletto di Bronzo - Ys (1972)
Banco del Mutuo Soccorso - Banco del mutuo soccorso (1972)
Banco del Mutuo Soccorso - Darwin! (1972)
Franco Battiato - Fetus (1972)
Orme - Uomo di pezza (1972)
Premiata Forneria Marconi - Per un amico (1972)
Return Receipt Requested - Per... un mondo di cristallo (1972)
Alan Sorrenti - Aria (1972)
Aktuala - Aktuala (1973)
Alphataurus - Alphataurus (1973)
Area - Arbeit macht frei (1973)
Banco del Mutuo Soccorso - Io sono nato libero (1973)
Campo di Marte - Campo di Marte (1973)
Cervello - Melos (1973)
Dedalus - Dedalus (1973)
Jumbo - Vietato ai minori di 18 anni? (1973)
Latte e miele - Papillon (1973)
Metamorfosi - Inferno (1973)
Museo Rosenbach - Zarathustra (1973)
Orme - Felona e Sorona (1973)
Osanna - Palepoli (1973)
Perigeo - Abbiamo tutti un blues da piangere (1973)
Rovescio della Medaglia - Contaminazione (1973)
Semiramis - Dedicato a Frazz (1973)
Alusa Fallax - Intorno alla mia cattiva educazione (1974)
Area - Caution radiation area (1974)
Arti e Mestieri - Tilt (1974)
Lucio Battisti - Anima latina (1974)
Biglietto per l'Inferno - Biglietto per l'inferno (1974)
Juri Camisasca - La finestra dentro (1974)
Canzoniere del Lazio - Lassa stà la me creatura (1974)
Premiata Forneria Marconi - L’isola di niente (1974)
Quella Vecchia Locanda - Il tempo della gioia (1974)
Franco Falsini - Cold Nose (1975)
Goblin - Profondo rosso (1975)
Maxophone - Maxophone (1975)
Napoli Centrale - Napoli Centrale (1975)
Pooh - Un po’ del nostro tempo migliore (1975)
Celeste - Celeste (1976)
Roberto Colombo - Sfogatevi bestie (1976)
Picchio dal Pozzo - Picchio dal pozzo (1976)
Locanda delle Fate - Forse le lucciole non si amano più (1977)
Pierrot Lunaire - Gudrun (1977)
Stormy Six - L'apprendista (1977)
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