17 songs - My autobiography (2)

1988

Once again... when you leave from a very high top, you end up falling down. Inevitably!
However, unlike in 1986... 1988 wasn’t a disappointment and it wasn’t even apathetic, just a year full of many questions... which then found an answer in the following year. About which, as I wrote several times, I have already told.

But let's go step by step.
We skied, we went around and around, we were working. Alberto Tomba too was skiing and winning, though at the time I didn’t follow sport on tv much because I was always around! Wake up early, go out almost every night...
And then Annalisa left me down. The reasons... well, let's say that you can read Mele a metà then, as already mentioned (!) and so Sign your name, Rent, The night you murdered love and even Once upon a long ago by Paul McCartney (listened to on New Year's Eve night, just before going to the party and watch her shine in her big long skirt/shoes/tulle white stockings... and some little envy from my side)... left nothing but a void.
A horrible emptiness, vast, unbridgeable. Her eyes and her smile, anywhere. Friends, songs, work... all so incomplete. The spring sun, cold as the light in that office where they had moved me because I used to dress as a paninaro (and just think what’ve happened if I had worn a dress!)
Giorni randagi, yep, as Enrico Ruggeri was singing now. Now I was really a King without a crown. And I'm not scared from Eight Wonder, so beautiful ("keep the dogs away from me"). Josephine by Chris Rea, mythical. Doctorin' the house by Coldcut and the House which begins to spread. The carnival party, and me dressed in Star Trek-style (!)
Broken Land by Adventures "when did the boy become a man" and that famous rainy afternoon in April when I realized the difference between child and adult. King's Cross and Pet Shop Boys who were talking about London, again: the city that I always seemed to know without ever having been there, and that I would have soon visited!
Reckless from Africa Bambataa with UB40, perfect and danceable, in my mind associated to Andamento lento by Tullio De Piscopo. The Collection from Ultravox, listened again and again during weekend trips: Dancing with tears in my eyes, Vienna, Hymn, Lament...

I was deeply involved into the new edition of the Philips contest and so in March I won the first prize! And again the trip to Milano, new friends, articles in the newspaper... some friend, in the spring, had said "but you’re always working, you're going out rather seldom" and I had replied that it was worth it.
I went back often to Milano then, in those months, both to attend more courses with the bank and to meet other people who wanted me to work with them. And in May I took my first plane, towards Erice! And from the plane window I looked down and saw Italy's profile and meanwhile I was listening to This alone is love by A-ha...
That image stuck with me, exactly as I hoped at that time! In fact, in those months... among work, waking up early, having lost that girl so beautiful and... a general feeling among friends, I felt it was over. That youth was over (this time seriously, more seriously than with Wham’s The Final two years earlier) and now everything would have slipped away without a trace.

I’d say that it didn’t happen, no.
A girl I met in Milano, an unimportant short love story. Seeing my features recognized, features somehow too much for that employment as a clerk (!) and obtaining a transfer to the data processing center, where I was to learn so many new things. Then there were projects on my computer, in the evening, in the afternoon... Blind from Talking Heads. Cars and girls from Prefab Sprout. A trip to Montecarlo, at the Sea exhibition. Suedehead by the Smiths. Stop loving you by Toto. Etienne by Guesch Patti, strong stuff for real men (!) and Hungry eyes and She's like the wind from Dirty dancing soundtrack. And that My heart keeps missing you by Rick Astley, that came into my brain on a Saturday morning and made me die of nostalgia for my ex. "I’m back at thinking about her..." – you can find it, precisely, in my other book.


Concerts... Michael Jackson, Sting. And then arrange the holidays: how much I traveled that year! Yeah, now I had some serious income and so... I even ordered a new car, but it would take eight months to arrive. Oh well, it is (was) Italy...

The inter-rail, the myth of riding by train through the entire beloved Europe (loved even today...) had been with me forever: and so in those weeks we prepared, we bought the tickets, we changed a bit of money and now we were ready! I also purchased a backpack.
On July 11th we left Porta Nuova in direction of Lyon. And in twenty-one days we turned to many places... Paris, Amsterdam, Copenhagen, Oslo, Stockholm... Berlin! With its Wall that was a… touching experience. And then London, of course, and even Dublin. Once again I was to spread the music, through my Walkman and a pair of small speakers purchased in Paris: S-Express, from a stranger eponymous group, reminds me of the atmospheres of that trip (especially the S-Bahn train in East Berlino!)... along with faces, writings, photographs... the Milli Vanilli with their strange Girl you know it's true... Matt Bianco with his lesser-known CD Indigo... oh and of course 101 by Depeche Mode, just fabulous! The live version of Stripped is outstanding, "the initial notes are the most beautiful, among the most beautiful that I know of" as I wrote one day. "...when the instrumental part of Stripped with its crescendo starts... I literally melt. It deploys such a solemnity. It’s a crescendo, but steady. It’s an orgasm which never comes. "

And then came the autumn. I did never stop, huh? I went to Oktoberfest, another dream... timeless. And after Europe I had been to the seaside, in Puglia. I continued writing, completing my famous first novel started one year before and then knocking out that funny stuff that teased good-naturedly (!) our friend during the holiday.
Circles in the sand by Belinda Carlisle, so sweet and also feminine. Domino dancing by Pet Shop Boys: wonderful! And Twist in my sobriety by Tanita Tikaram, beautiful, dark "time to risk a life, a life". Riding on a train, and Tribute by Pasadenas - the boy band before its time! Tracy Chapman and her serious topics. Lucio Dalla together with Gianni Morandi in Vita - existential like the other ones, too, in its own way. Memories of a trip to the Colle delle Finestre, in those early days of October.

But (in fact) the gap was growing larger. I’ve got a perfectly clear representation of this... emotion: Dublin port, me staying in there for one night and a friend who leaves to Cork... and my search for an answer. Yeah, the answer to some relatively normal things: who are we, where are we going... what is life...
But, at that moment, as I have often told, I was just... restless. Looking for something I didn’t even know what shape it had. And intimidated by a future... I couldn’t quite define, but that I certainly didn’t see very well in my employment state.
Find out, find out what this fear is about, Tears for Fears were echoing from that LP dating three years before. Who was he who paid me to learn from my mistakes? And could I accept this for long? Anyway, one funny black and white picture - because I was printing them myself!! - together with a nice girl older than me... still stands.

As it is perhaps natural, I immersed myself in a past... which now, three years later, looked like gold - the golden age, as I called it in a discussion with the new big friend from bank. I couldn’t speak for my friends, or rather I couldn’t do it today either: but I hadn’t yet realized that my perception of time was far different from the average.
And so we stood and listened to the album from A-ha, Hunting high and low, or Careless Whisper, or The dream of the blue turtles by Sting or even (thanks, it must be said, to the concert Human rights now) La vita è adesso and E adesso la pubblicità from Baglioni (!), and especially the latter now was filling me with sadness... further, with that "oggi è quasi un secolo di noia/che si fa domani e dopo/e poi nei prossimi vent’anni" (somehow similar to cosa si fa / dove si va / questa sera from Ramazzotti's Un cuore con le ali two years earlier).
Even my new car, finally arrived, hadn't given me any special feeling.

We kept going out a lot, anyway. The disco music was getting contaminated by the already hinted house but... somehow we danced with it! Then there were Don’t worry be happy by Bobby McFerrin and Soul food to go by Manhattan Transfer, which remind me of that nice friend who came to work in the bank with me; and even Orinoco flow by Enya... so Christmas-style (in the words of a friend) or so Nordic-style, depending on your point of view... Desire from U2, again, it wasn’t thrilling me, but reminds me of the movie Rattle and hum watched together to a friend in that December.
And Too late Marlene, from the little known album Big Thing from Duran Duran which reminds me of those early morning before I get out my mother's home and jump on the bus to work, and also that Marilena soon to enter our group of friends (and in the end those names in Mele a Metà were originated from this too)

And by the end of the year, maybe because of fatigue accumulated during all of it (!!) or perhaps the decision I had taken to leave that job and go for something much more fascinating and challenging in Milano... I developed one of those strong flu, quite uncommon for me!

Meanwhile, they elected George Bush. And, in those months, would then be set Donnie Darko... I've always found it significant (!)


Let’s mention the remarkable Is this love by Whitesnake: it belongs to 1988!

Domino dancing, Pet Shop Boys.

Tribute, Pasadenas

I’m not scared, Eight Wonder

 1989

This dance music was beginning to get a little boring... that is it was less beautiful, to the point that when Francesco Salvi made parodies of house tracks like C’è da spostare una macchina or Esatto! he was absolutely right! Then it would come the techno... even worse. Only from 1993 onwards this type of music would have improved back.
In short, my New Year flu had passed and those two days we spent at the shelter were nice, and the beautiful sun on January 1st which saw us walking in the snow was a good omen. So I started going to Milano every day... I caught the bus and the train and then the subway and vice versa and everything was fine, apart from the fact that I was never taking a single moment of breath!
...And on twenty-fourth of January we went to the cinema - in some ways it does astonish me, thinking back at how I could travel 300 kilometers... five hours, plus eight at work and still have the will to go to the cinema without falling asleep. She... had reappeared in our group after one year: she looked sympathetic, well-mannered, pretty enough; we used to talk often, we phoned each other. We went out.
We kissed upon the tune from Simple Minds’ Mandela Day, that night, in my car: and suddenly my Peugeot 205 became unique!

From that moment on, just as I wrote several times, everything changed. An enveloping sweetness... not a love at first sight but something which was growing slowly... in our meetings, in carnivals (she as a strawberry, me as Freddy Kruger), going out together with friends...
Two hearts, by Phil Collins. A master, a Myth, even in that little but so cute recent movie (Buster) and his clean and honest face - like mine, indeed! A little-known True love by Glenn Frey I’m finding among the tapes of those months. The collection from Dire Straits, recorded a few weeks before. Amor de mis amores by Paco, which is stuck in there because one girl in our group used to hum it. Promised Land by Joe Smooth, out in the latest months of 1988, now sounded better. And soon the Style Council would have made a cover of it.
It's only love by Simply Red. It was as if the journey that had began in 1985 with Money's too tight and Holding back the years and then continued in 1987 with The right thing and Infidelity... now had reached his goal: the entire album A new flame is gorgeous and it was the soundtrack of those months. One of soundtracks... how many memories of music records with very good vibrations! Oh well, it’s easy like this...

Only two sunny springs in a whole lifetime. Are they enough?

But let’s skip pessimism! We were on a trip to France at Easter and... it was so sweet. This is your land by Simple Minds, the underrated Street fighting years LP which also contained Mandela day, Belfast child and Biko... with their serious topics and well played as always. Madonna’s Like a prayer... which in fact wasn’t much but, at least, the rest of the album contained many beautiful songs, from Express yourself to Cherish to Oh father to Spanish eyes to Till death do us part (quoted in Promesse!)
Holly Johnson from Frankie Goes to Hollywood and not-yet-gay (!!) singing Love train, and I smile every morning as I catch my train. She drives me crazy by Fine young cannibals. Respect by Adeva - which of course I didn’t know it was a cover of Aretha Franklin. Then Jericho’s Big area, so sweet and soft in those evenings, as well as Bangles’ Eternal flame. And of course Lullaby by Cure and shortly after Lovesong, the hymn to love in the right place at the right time! Nothing has been proved, by Dusty Springfield produced by Pet Shop Boys.
And a curious Keep the light of the candle on forever, which to nowadays I have never seen again... maybe someone can help me: looked like Prefab Sprout or another nordic group similar to the Dream Academy... and it was so nostalgic but hopeful, pleading... I was especially impressed, connected with the fact that the Torino football team was to be demoted to B Series and "the hope was fading" - as a sports reporter said on the radio.
Oh well 
But I want to mention Fleischmann and Pons’ cold fusion experiment: another... coincidence, or inspiration, or dream (!)

And then came the warm season. Americano by Holly Johnson, so perfect! So 80's and celebrating as well - even if perhaps he wanted to be ironic... and I had the Chinos trousers as it was said in the song, as well as having been on the Mersey in Liverpool just a few months before. A track between the house and disco like Move your feet (to the rhythm of the beat) by Hit House. You on my mind and The waiting game by Swingout sister. Wait and Choices, again the Blow Monkeys. Stringimi by Matia Bazar, and that picture in Stresa (...) - where, by the way, over a wall someone had written the words from the chorus of Depeche Mode’s Blasphemous rumours: the one in which it’s implied that God has a sick sense of humor... how true it was, how true it would’ve been.
Papa Winnie’s Rootsie and Boopsie, and me and Daniela who… from our car, watch Nicola and Cinzia intent on doing things in their car, and subconsciously start dreaming of when we’ll do them too (!)
Holiday nights by Den Harrow was cool on my car radio the day of Tiananmen square... I love to cross the themes like this! The night before we had some argument with Daniela and so on Sunday morning I went for a ride in my car... then, in the afternoon, we were in Cumiana and everything was settled back to normal.
What I am and Circle by Eddie Brickell. People hold on from a young Lisa Stansfield along with Coldcut. And in general, it was clear that This time is for real, like Donna Summer sang in a yet another success of the trio Stock-Aitken-Waterman.

Meanwhile, going to Milano every day was (of course) becoming quite heavy: I should’ve rent a house there, even if it cost a lot, and so I was still pondering about it... but the arrival of Daniela in my life had naturally changed the perspective. And so I decided to leave that job, even if reluctantly. In June I was then free to think about my future (and sleep till late as my brain needed/needs), which I began to imagine as a self-employed, perhaps along with my old friends.
And to go out with my girlfriend.

The miracle by Queen took us to the holidays - correctly. And shortly after Eurythmics enforced the point, with The miracle of love (strictly speaking, it belonged to their 1986 album, but it appears in my tapes now). Nothing ever by chance, right? 
Loud music up and down the Italian highways, we so happy in my beautiful little car with its sunroof! And Oro incenso e birra from Zucchero represented the top of my respect for him... Nice (Nietzsche) che dice, Madre dolcissima, Diamante...
The best from Tina Turner. Self-dedicated, isn’t it?!
It's alright by Pet Shop Boys – exactly - and that videoclip on television, at my mother’s house. Dr. Jazz and Mr. Funk from Ladri di biciclette, which I began to worship. A sad Are you just using me from a certain Richenel (but written by George Michael, as only now I find out - and it makes perfect sense!), who reappeared after two years... which sometimes made me think about how I would feel if Daniela was ever to let me down. She at the station (back from work) feeling not so well, and so I go and pick her up.
Blaze of glory by Joe Jackson: little known but... absolutely a perfect soundtrack for those months, because it was only ours.
Even Liberi liberi from Vasco Rossi, not bad (and me wondering on whether Daniela envies her sister). Or the new and less famous Heart like a sky by Spandau Ballet - now almost fading into extinction, as it was logical: after all Raf had just sung Cosa resterà degli anni ‘80...

And I’d like to open and quickly close a parenthesis dedicated to Roxette... because I’ve already spoken extensively about them in my short book My love, according to Roxette - which of course I do recommend (!)

In short, everything was perfect. More than 1985, more than 1987. Of course.
With so many positive vibes, world could only get better - I was convinced. I'm still convinced, and it works in both directions (!!!)
So, thanks to the continued push by Gorbachev (I love to stress out, born on March 2nd and got to power in 1985...), the Berlin Wall was crumbling. And on November 9th, 1989 the door opened, and the worst thing I had ever seen (as I had written in my diary one year earlier during the inter rail) disappeared from the planet. I didn’t know why it had hurt me so much, that Wall: I think it was something related to Germany, the Germans... because my dad liked/loved them, for example for their sense of order.
Or the war and the harm it can do. But in other countries there were or there had been conflicts too, if we consider Northern Ireland or Catalonia and... even if those used to hurt me too, it wasn’t like Berlin.
Beloved Berlin. Five years later everything would’ve taken shape. Almost, I mean...

Anyway, the world was improving. And my fears were fading - had faded! Thanks to Her, thanks to all that I had never felt before, and now it was there.
But... for various reasons, little by little she was no longer enough for me. In part, there were reasons related to my being at the wrong place - I could feel it all the time, in our moments of intimacy and the peak would come in our New Year's Eve holiday; but on the other hand those were tied to her being small. Not interested in higher things, like certain ideal, a certain way of thinking about work, and the world. Learning about other cultures, travel: I've never traveled a lot, but I think I have done a proper amount of it. And I do have an idea of the world.
Probably I could have stayed with her and cut my wings and live happily, but it wasn’t possible, no... I wouldn’t be the person I am and of which I'm proud!

So, little by little our Love went crumbling: she got stuck to me even more (I’ve already spoken of this too...), and in short, autumn was again a little messed up.
The miracle of love, in fact. And then Rock and a hard place by Rolling Stones, Sacrifice by Elton John (and the LP title, Sleeping with the past, so appropriate), the silly I go to pieces by some unknown, which made us laugh every time because I used to sing it along like "I'm going to picie (=whores)" and Daniela laughed out loud! And of course Sowing the seeds of love (anything can happen, sowing the seeds of love) and the whole LP from Tears for Fears, which were confirming themselves as a band that never missed a beat: Advice for the young at heart would mark Christmas and then New Year's Eve in the towns over French mountain... the frozen lakes.

I had found a new job, and everything seemed to go great: the boss was very fond of me and I... to put it short, a bit less of him, as I got to knew him better. Eh...
Friends were now all in a love affair and used to always go out in pairs and it often seemed a bit... boring. Eh... (again). To admit that Enough from Simply Red had been somewhat of a premonition bothered me, yet it was so. Even dancing, of course, we were doing it much less often, and often it wasn’t clear if it was because of my current state or the less beautiful music.

For the rest, Gorbachev and Solidarnosc continued in fact to make the world a better place. And when they executed Ceausescu and his wife at Christmas, it sounded perfect. Sometimes the world needs certain things...
Oh, right: in July there had been a concert by Pink Floyd in Venice! An important historical event... if only I had liked Pink Floyd 

Lovesong, Cure

The miracle, Queen

The seeds of love, Tears for fears

 1990

Think twice / it’s another day for you and me in paradise.
Phil Collins had begun singing Another day in paradise a few weeks before.

I had been thinking about that long enough, and on that February 5th I decided to leave. For a variety of reasons quite clear, and a heavy but thoughtful decision: and I remember how they were those days... those four days without her, after one full year. Then, on February 9th, she came looking for me and somehow we set off again together.
Only to give the start to a time made of back and forth of which I could’ve easily done without: but, unfortunately, you have to live certain experiences in life, in order to learn a lesson and so... despite the remaining year and a half was never as high as 1989, I learned several lessons that I would have used not to repeat some of those mistakes.

All Phil Collins’ work was nice, and Something happened on the way to heaven in particular was quite touching, again.
I was always working a lot, both in the small company and at my house in the evening. And I often preferred working instead of going out with Daniela or friends...

Nothing compares 2 U from Sinead o’ Connor was the song she dedicated to me when we let it down. And Enjoy the silence by Depeche Mode was my counter-dedication: all I ever needed, is here, in my arms.
Meanwhile there were the Skid Row with 18 and life: it was me, who felt the need to be Someone Who Does Things, like at eighteen. Good things, to be precise, unlike the protagonist of that song!
The whole Violator, probably the best album of Depeche Mode, of whom, anyway, I like everything. And in spring, Primavera by Luca Carboni: Persone silenziose seemed to be the consecration album, his maturity... Ci stiamo sbagliando hadn’t thrilled me, and then Farfallina and Vieni a vivere con me were better, and this LP was really great.
"Lascia ad altri i progetti troppo lunghi / arricchisci il tuo tempo e non cercare più del pane quotidiano" was my mantra against boredom that seemed to come from the words of the various Marco, Nicola... Now I was fine, I had overcome those crises from 1988: I had found out what love was and had kept intact my ideals, and so I couldn’t understand why they had to be this… pessimistic, let's say, though seemingly happy. I would have understood only much later.
I only needed to consolidate the love, the sweetness that had been with someone who shared my dreams and my ideals, and I was sure she would come soon...

Anyway, we went skiing again, rightly so: and I spent a full day at the slopes humming I burn for you from Vitamin Z and thinking about a cute chick who was working in our office. Then there was Butterfly on a wheel by Mission, sweet and somewhat poignant: be careful not to be the butterfly crashed by the wheel...
And Lisa Stansfield, especially with All around the world. Yeah, "and I can’t find my girlfriend." Toward the end of that year I dubbed this singer "Annalisa" going back, in my mind, to those eyes from three years earlier.
And A face in the crowd, Tom Petty. And Driving, from Everything but the girl. And Basia (of Matt Bianco), with Baby you're mine and Cruising for bruising. Incidentally, at this beginning of 1990 I rediscovered Stereotomy by Alan Parsons, which for some reason we didn’t like much as it was published, and I found it very nice - like all their production! And then I created a compilation of all their instrumental tracks (they used to always put two in each disc) which was perfect for some long trips in the car.
Ah, right, the first record by Elio e le storie tese I remember was out that spring: John Holmes... and it didn’t tell me much. Perhaps because it was about dicks  even if just to laugh, or maybe... I don’t know. In the end, they never inspired me that much, and it’s obviously not a problem of themes or profanity... something straight to the skin...
Right, concerning sex we mention Grazia Di Michele too, and her Le ragazze di Gauguin: I couldn’t stand her. And it was obvious, since I wanted to be one of those girls.
And talking about love, let’s remember Jenny Morris’ She has to be loved, that Daniela loved a lot - for quite logical reasons (!)
The spring concert by Tears for Fears at the Sports hall, Easter in Novi Ligure as guests of Luca - and the famous photo in bed just waken up.

I traveled a lot in 1990, too. Not with Daniela, of course, and not because of me.
We were often in Milano for business. Then in Moscow and Leningrad with friends from the bank (I would specify gay friends, if this made any sense  however look for Frankie Goes to Leningrad) and in Hanover with my boss and... This was a grind (the guy, as I said, was not so good)... but Germany again! And then around the east European countries now free: Czechoslovakia, Poland, Berlin and Dresden, Budapest. It was interesting, it was informative, it was nice to dream the Polish girls so sweet and somewhat ancient. I think it would’ve taken me several years to figure out what I liked of those situations, yep. Black Velvet by Alannah Myles, Violence of summer by Duran Duran, Billy Idol’s Cradle of love – what an energy! A collection from ABC, already loved here and there in previous years. Steamy windows, by Tina Turner, will always remind me of the theoretically serious gay friend who used to listen to this song from his walkman on the plane, using the new headphones he had just bought in Vienna’s airport.
But, in fact, overall taste wasn’t very good. Because, exactly, I was looking at the other girls and I didn’t like that: speaking of ABC, going at Annalisa’s house after leaving Daniela at home, listening to The look of love at highest volume was... depressing. That is, I believed in it, and I was hoping it: but it only made me feel bad inside.
And the Kuwait invasion on August 2nd confirmed that the world was aware that I wasn’t feeling very well.

As we returned from our tour, we spent ten days in Senigallia together to our girlfriends and... I couldn’t stand her anymore. And even less I bore the thought of making sex to her without love... as I said, I would just put a lot of time to understand that for average human beings this isn’t an obstacle. But, as I wrote in Accadde qualcosa, I couldn’t accept it: it had been my Daniela, she was the most important thing in my life, it just couldn’t be this stuff here.
We had danced New kids on the block’s Step by step and Found love by Double Dee and I can’t stand it by 24/7: at least these tracks were beautiful and danceable as we liked (unlike, say, Pump up the Jam by Technotronic) - although we mocked those silly little voices inserted in virtually every track out in those months: "uuuh, yeah!" hypnotically repeated.

So, in September, it came Piccola stella senza cielo by Ligabue and then It must have been Love by Roxette, on which I won’t spend any more words - as I said. I want the fairy tale, I kept telling myself like Julia Roberts in the movie and I was telling to basically anyone around, and it’s also because of this that I began to think back to those eyes from three years earlier...
However, Roxette would give their best in 1991!
My job wasn’t enough: I couldn’t stand my boss’ lack of ethics... at the time I wouldn’t have called it so, because I was talking about him with people who over the years would become exactly like him (!) Anyway, it was obvious that my destiny was a job on my own and starting-up a company.

Praying for time by George Michael, and Mother's pride and Cowboys and angels... a rainy day in Varallo where I had worked three years before, making love to Daniela in my car while I was dying inside because she wasn’t enough to me: and in some ways, as I admitted much later, it wasn’t enough to make love in my own body; but that wasn’t the real problem, because in fact if it had been enough, that is, if I had endured to have sex with her without fully estimating her and her ideals, maybe I would’ve become a loser... more or less like everybody else.
Even My Antarctica and Serious from Duran Duran talk to me of those tragic days.... It seemed impossible, but it was all dark again. Being Boring by Pet Shop Boys... boredom, those sounds and those words shouting we were never being boring but to the past tense. Ti amo e non lo sai from Baccini - the Francesco Baccini we had loved spending evenings in our car one year and a half before, when he was singing Figlio unico and Fotomodelle and made us laugh - now it seemed just the ongoing refrain that my girlfriend (depending on the week) or ex was repeating to me. Ah, right, also her friend Cinzia used to repeat that quite often...
Cinzia whose boyfriend, however, had been shocked by Enigma’s Sadeness (moreover we had misrepresented it in Sadness). In fact, from Maria Magdalena and Samurai to Sadeness... there seemed to be an abyss of sadness, death.
We were all feeling rather bad, the Gulf War was coming and it really looked like El Diablo, as Litfiba were singing (which I had just glimpsed in Il vento... tieni a mente tienanmen... without knowing them at all) was putting his hand. And indeed a devil came into our lives in those months... probably the first real breakthrough towards adulthood. And the disappointments you can take unless you're very careful: I was always very careful indeed and I could’ve spotted the catch but... somehow they made me fall inside of it.
My friends, I say. Or supposed ones.

For New Year's Eve, I wanted to make a trip abroad, maybe back to Prague or Warsaw, ‘cause we had liked them a lot (and not just because of girls): of course she didn’t want to, and so we spent three days in Val d'Aosta just after Christmas, then I left with the usual friends from the group from 1987.
That guilt, those tears while listening to... Early morning or Crying in the Rain from the new album by A-ha: and indeed from then onward I remember I have always seen them sad... as if they too had suffered from old age. Let’s say, maybe!

I quarreled with my boss, at Christmas: and it was obvious to me that that chapter would end soon. So, along with my friends, we talked more and more about starting our own company and doing the things we liked to do: we used to meet in the evening and make plans... Tom's diner by Suzanne Vega was on the radio... sad, that one too. I couldn’t accept that I wasn’t to raise a company together with my lover.


As a side note, Tomba kept winning, Pertini died, someone killed a woman in via Poma in Rome and then the judge Livatino. None of that compared to the World Cup (!!) in Italy: they were all bad vibrations, apart from Germany winning. Daniela’s lightweight skirt, that summer... it was so exciting...

Germany also won another battle in November: the reunification was complete!


I find Epic from Faith No More in this year, and I know it since very little time - thanks as always to Virgin Radio! Beautiful beautiful.

Another day in paradise, Phil Collins

Being boring, Pet Shop Boys

Step by step, New kids on the block

 1991

I dedicated I've been thinking about you by Londonbeat, in that month of January, to a girl I had met in Prague. She wasn’t exactly the ideal of Polish girl I had built into my mind the year before, but... I was just not thinking about sex (!)
I liked the idea of visiting that city, and having experienced the mess (at the party but not only) of a nation finally free from the Communist/Soviet oppression: and I liked the idea of having friends from all over Europe. And I even began to find vaguely annoying my country and many of its distortions...

Anyway, changes were on the horizon and, as it often happens when you don’t have enough courage for an act of rupture (courage that usually never fails me, but...) here they come into play unexpected and disruptive factors.
I continued working in the place that now was really annoying, but I didn’t stop learning: reading magazines, imagining projects, things that could have been sold in our company. Marco, Paolo... now we were meeting quite often together, and we also found back Alberto (another schoolmate from middle school, to me always a bit on the sidelines).
Sure, at the moment there was no happiness. Il volo by Litfiba - coupled with that Something sad by Timothy B. Schmit - ...disturbed me, really. Perhaps, actually, they have troubled me more in later years, when I got back (that million times, in fact) to the only love I had had and how it was dissolving... potevi avere il mondo, ma l’hai lasciato là... come si fa ad amare…
Move right out and Cry for help by Rick Astley, the great guy who was switching jackets two years earlier and I was smiling while eating breakfast before going to Milano... now he seemed to be sending me new tips after the (in fact, even if somewhat less) famous Take me to your heart. Raf with Oggi un dio non ho and Marco Masini with Il niente (and to some extent, also Perché lo fai…) brought further sadness. The Malinconoia, precisely.
The Gulf War began and ended, so to say. And in Puglia they began to land the Albanians... compared with the facts of these days it looks like a joke.

I will always remember (of course) that I met Marina, my schoolmate at college... the one for which I had been Blue one day in December 1986... on Valentine's Day in 1991 as I went to the Politecnico by chance and met her who had just graduated! No, never a single thing by chance...
I wonder what person would I have been between 1985 and 1986 if I had courted her more seriously, and had I not been intimidated by her being… too serious. But, at eighteen, I think I was right. Come si fa ad amare... (only you know it)

We used to go skiing but our women were not very convinced. Anyway, one reason more or one less... (!) All this time by Sting annoyed me because he, in the videoclip, he seemed to pose as Jesus - a kind of exaggerated self-exaltation similar to the one that had brought me to hate Madonna... the year before: they all seemed to have become full of themselves – and also relatively less good.
In the clubs they played The power by Snap, and it wasn’t bad! Then yep the Londonbeat and other stuff, not many noteworthy... it should be pointed out. In those days it was still possible to think about dancing to the rhythm of I'm your baby tonight from Whitney Houston, which brought me back to one of the trips we made in the autumn... so sad: I remember that lilac-purple sky at sunset returning to Monginevro... she by my side in my car... and what had been two years before, all gone.

Before going off to work, I used to watch the videoclip from Seal’s Crazy – a special one, and it will stay forever to remind me of my new colleague Davide who used to call our boss crazy. And when we went to visit our famous friend with the ping-pong table, we were listening to Call it poison from Escape club.

And so it came the summer, for that year too. And what a summer (!!) Piero Maso and his family tragedy struck Italians. And the Moby Prince and then the Haven too (with its oil spread over the Ligurian beaches!). Occhetto was trying to bring his party - now overtaken by history - into the future... And on TV they were transmitting the new Star Trek series, the one with the bald captain and... well, it didn’t look that good.
The notes from Innuendo and Headlong and I'm going slightly mad from Queen were fading (The show must go on would’ve been discussed in the next fall, after Freddie's death - a well-designed work). Keep on Jammin by Stefano Secchi was the proper follow-up to I say yeah from one year before and it was remarkable for dancing and listening! And among the... crappy house/techno we remember We need freedom by Antico, acceptable and full of energy.
Mad about you was a masterpiece again, by Sting. Rush Rush by Paula Abdul, so touching, and me sometimes calling a girl on the phone, one we had met on New Year’s Eve in Valle Stretta. I wanna sex you up by Color me badd and Gipsy Woman by Crystal Waters. Volo anch’io by Matia Bazar... beautiful, but too similar (in a different context too) to Stringimi. Losing my religion and later Shining happy people through which I met the REM and of course I began to love them. How can you not love REM? 
And of course Joyride by Roxette: "the synthesis, the perfection, the pinnacle, the joy of living, playing, traveling, singing; what a rhythm: together, he and her, in unison" as I wrote over there.
Fantastic, really! And soon after, Fading like a flower... with those large squares of European capitals... I wanted to visit them again.

So I decided to go back to the north. Of course she would not want to come, and so I asked a friend, one a little strange, you know... and then there was our New Year's Eve contact. Who, of course, misunderstood... or, at least, let’s say that the misunderstanding would come a few months later. However, I was sincere in my desire to go back there for a bit of everything.
We travelled many kilometers again, only this time by train: we visited several cities along with Alicja (or Alice, as I called her at the time) and it was nice enough. Fantasy by Earth wind & fire played out of a shop in Cracow... And in my walkman there was also Summertime by DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince (aka Will Smith), and other amenities like Joey Salinas with the legendary Rocking Romance ("I go slow I-I-go slow") or Love and understanding from Cher, one of her few songs that I find beautiful. And Calm the rage from the pseudo-Wham Terry Ronald  and Ring ring ring by De La Soul (old famous Giovanni made a rapper  ). And a little bit of See the lights and Let there be love from the new Simple Minds record, and just a glimpse at On every street by Dire Straits, forever tied to that end-summer and the events that happened. Or the little-known but significant Learning how to hate from Black.
On the way back, it was waiting for me the start of our new company we had just opened... and not by chance Gino Paoli was singing Quattro amici... (!): we were all destinati a qualcosa di più di una donna ed un impiego in banca... at least I was convinced about that - being us four, I mean. Who wanted cambiare tutto questo mondo che non va...
(parlando di lavoro, va anche notata la contestuale O' scarrafone di Pino Daniele (mai amato particolarmente) e il bravo guaglione, elettricista come Paolo :) )

During the four days we spent (yet) at the seaside with Daniela, there was the sudden coup in the Soviet Union and the sign was such a blatant... premonition of what would happen in a few days. Basically I knew well that the destinies... mine and the world’s, were closely related: and when my eyes became wet while talking about this topic in a cafè in Lerici, and she smiled at me and told me not to get too involved... I laughed a little and I concentrated on this fact already quite obvious in those days. I could never believe that a country would rebel against him who had given them freedom and a future: that a person so respectable was to be betrayed...
Two days later, my so-called friends tended me (not coincidentally, in Superga) a trap, an accomplice or rather the creator being the famous devil brought into our group by their girlfriends... (other adjectives are not suitable here) the autumn before. And so they accused me of several things - all false; and they were very happy to give up five million lire to this poor con man, exchanging them with words... words... nonsense and various vaunting...
So, in short, I told myself that the just-opened company had to be closed. I said this to them... in response the scammer vented against me, and we lived some pretty good evenings...
Really, for the first time I felt I had learned to hate. I was twenty-four years old and I had never been in a fight with anyone and... the moment seemed to have arrived.
In fact, nothing came out of it. Reluctantly, my so-called friends agreed to oust the guy from our working relationships, in late october. The serious part is that they didn’t chase him away from their friendship and most importantly they didn’t make the distinction between honest and dishonest (or between Good and Evil) that I had started doing as I was growing up... and this all would have re-emerged, years later.

I was fairly shocked, for some time. Meeting again those people I had known for a decade now... made me almost scared. Paolo was acting as peacemaker/feel-good (at that time this word was not as negative as it would become in the future) and Marco seemed suspicious to me as much as I was to him - and this had its some grounds, given that we were very similar, as he himself had stated in those days.
I adore mi amor by Color me badd... Everything I do from Bryan Adams, Tears run rings by Marc Almond, an unlikely dance track obtained by sampling There must be an angel from Annie Lennox (I think it was What can you do for me by Utah Saints)... everything was quite disturbing. Marco was moving in another warehouse and seeing those places... where we had grown up, where we had laughed and dreamed and listened to songs for ten years... now empty, made me sick. For the way it had ended, I mean: or, if not properly ended, the way it had been marked.
I had started to work assiduously for a couple of customers: one in Milano, to whom I had got in touch through my old boss and that had been liking to me right away, and in fact I had already sold him some stuff before the summer; and then a hospital in Torino, met through a friend of a friend... friend, as would have often happened in the future, who would’ve vanished when the company risks (read: having to work maybe two days for sixteen hours straight, or wait for a payment for six months) would have materialized.
Matt Bianco’s Macumba, was another apt song, in those months... needing mandatory compensation: and in fact the accountant who had backed the fraudster was dead! Also Ci vuole un fisico bestiale by Luca Carboni was perfectly suited for those convulsive times ("tu che cercavi comprensione/ti trovi lì in competizione" and "le cene con tipi furbi ed arroganti"). And then Paper doll by PM Dawn, so sweet on that November 1st, and Something got me started by Simply Red, fantastic again, and Guaranteed by Level 42 ("a place in my heart, guaranteed"... devoted to Daniela) and new album by Michael Jackson, Dangerous, introduced by Black or white! Remember the time has impressed me because on a day in November... no, not any day but the 29th, San Saturnino... I met Daniela or rather crossed into her car and... her direction and the street where we met confirmed me that the poor one was dating the crook from summer, for real. My "friends" had mentioned it to me, and back then I didn’t want to believe it: it was as if Jesus Christ had moved from being the son of God to the son of Satan (!!!) but...
But, in fact, it was all a ridiculous maneuver from the fraudster: thinking as a poor-male-fool, he had tried to make me wrong, and accused me among other things of willing to take chances on Marco’s former girlfriend (needless to say it shouldn’t be a problem but... you know how stupid people get stunned, don’t you? It’s almost 1994 after all!) ... but I had really wanted to leave my ex down, and so finally the result had been achieved! I remember getting in the car of that chap for "business reasons" and seeing the ABC’s tape that I had recorded one year before for Daniela... had annoyed me. But oh well... And then one day at the beginning of December, friends caught me in my car listening to Joe Jackson. But I overcame everything - at least at that time : by the way, I discovered only recently that Joe, our hero from 1989, had been singing a song titled Is she really going out with him... which described exactly how I was feeling in those months. And it belonged to an LP named Look sharp! just like the one from Roxette!!!
And Wind of change by Scorpions and More than words by Extreme sanctioned the change, or rather the changes that took place in my life. And in the world, yeah: the dream of a meaningful Russia crashed quickly on that Christmas when a poor drunkard named Yeltsin vented against that honest man named Gorbachev (does it bring anything back to your mind?!) bringing him almost to tears, and finally stating the fact that, if a population is made of savages... it won’t be one (or a few) sane persons who can pop them up.
In 2006, with the Olympic Games in Torino, I would have added another adjective to savage... but we’ll get there!

I was alone again, this time for real. Laid so low, to quote that new song from Tears for fears - a very bad and unfair feeling. And... that Annalisa’s double, known one year before and for whom I was listening George Michael’s Hand to mouth while headed to Rivoli like four years before... she wasn’t exactly the person I hoped. She let me down, but in fact I had confused the type. And the worst thing of all is that I would have committed this mistake again in the future...
Finally by CeCe Peniston and A deeper love by C&C Music Factory had to wait: it was not yet the right time for a Deep Love. And as I listened to A roller skating jam named “Saturdays” by De La Soul, good guys, I used to feel some… waves of a strange anxiety, a bit of scare, some nostalgia about discos, their atmospheres, their nights: something that came from Grease, some ten years before. And which would’ve gone on, and grown, in the few years to come.
Meanwhile, I had met other friends, two mingers from Puglia  one of which had been working for the census and this was her catchphrase... that is, asking people if she had been at their place in order to interview them. But, especially her (the smaller one), was very fond of music of all kinds and so we established a nice friendship relation. And with them and some others (not the old couples, and not the already-coupled Marco, in spite he too to the love he had been praising) I spent New Year's Eve at the disco.


Mafia, meanwhile, killed Libero Grassi. And just before Christmas Walter Chiari was dying, whom I had always loved among television comedians of the late '70s.

Joyride, Roxette

One, U2

Something got me started, Simply Red

 1992

Strange as it may seem, I liked One by U2. Seriously, a bit like Pride and not like various other songs belonging to those years, from With or without you to Desire to Where the streets and so on 
I recorded the entire CD at my usual friend’s and I also liked other tracks. Of course, One remained a step above.
Did I ask too much, more than a lot? / You gave me nothing, now it's all I got... (thinking back at Daniela)

My job was starting to sprint fine, to answer to questions/criticisms that different people objected to me in those times: from my mother, who had never recovered after me leaving the bank (!) to others who had followed my adventures with the fraudster from Settimo and they had grinned or anyway were worried about me.
At Christmas, we met some girls. As I often repeated over the years, it wasn’t me who had known them... me always so shy (and always in the wrong body, although I struggled to admit it). But it didn’t matter.
January passed among the usual cold, going to Milano, start managing a small accounting, a few movies including the legendary Terminator 2 (as well as JFK and Robin Hood with Kevin Costner, which at the time I liked a lot, almost as a man!) and some dancing at the discos. And then, later that month, the Polish girlfriend decided to pay me a visit and...
In short, you can find the story narrated in one of my tales! Let's say, as I mentioned, that there had been a misunderstanding: but, above all, with cool head I wasn’t feeling that she or her country or culture were what I was looking for my future...
Phone calls from one of several nag customers often disturbed our chats - even though I had mentioned him the exceptional event, exceptional at least for me; and even my mother didn’t prove particularly hospitable. And, finally, the two wenches went away, maybe a little... lost at the heart.

In February, we began to meet quite often with Laura, one of the girls from Christmas: to go dancing, in the pastry shop. And when the waiter spilled a milkshake over me in a cafè in Traiano avenue, I knew that there was a future with her!
I’m kidding, or almost. In the sense that I didn’t set it for sure at the moment... but in the past there had been various proofs that if was going to get Love or at least something like that, then I would’ve suffered some kind of damage in the previous days: and indeed at the end of January someone had stolen my set of speakers from the car... just like in 1989 they had forced the lock at the station, and likewise would happen again in the future (!)

On February 17th we went to the cinema, she and I: and, in spite of how I had felt a few days earlier after a night at the club... that is, let down in favor of Nicola, that's when the spark was shot.
On February 17, 1992. Sounds familiar? I have already expressed my theory, you can choose whether to believe it or not ;)

Sure, technically he was engaged. But I had started to know a little the humans... Laura then would’ve told me she wasn’t interested into him, and I believed her.
Then a dream began. Another, yes: but, somehow… thanks surely to all the experience gained in the previous years, everything looked better. I remember that I gave a qualification examination for the Chamber of Commerce, in those very first days and then I went to visit her and I had in mind the solo single by Tony Hadley, Lost in your Love... and I was happy! Because Laura seemed more concrete, she too directed towards some kind of self-employment and... oh well.
I loved her, I loved her eyes and her smile. I immediately tried not to do some things that I had happened to do earlier, like forgetting to buy drinks and the like (it shouldn’t be important, but... you know, there are some habits... that in fact I had never felt mine, perhaps because of that fact about being in the wrong place).
Carnival, with the legendary rally jumpsuit I had been given by my customer in Milano. The usual bowling, with the usual friends and eventually they had gone the days of The show must go on with its sadness at the untimely death of Freddie Mercury, or Spending my time by Roxette (...): now we're fine, and Laura is there (pardon the spoiler ) As well as that time in Ala di Stura, where I sprung into a "there is a heater (stufetta, ndt), and there’s also Lauretta" of which I think I got ashamed one moment later. But she wasn’t sorry about it: perhaps the fact that she was five years younger than me pushed me to... well, to be more fatherly. Who knows.

In fact, she was more awake. Than my ex, and often than me: for my birthday she organized a surprise party with my friends from the old group that she barely knew and... it scared me - because even the crap with the fraudster from a few months before had been organized without my knowledge. But this time it was different: it was for a good purpose!
Mariah Carey’s Make it happen marked those first few months... and it was so beautiful. And so it was You're the best thing from D:Ream, a real dream! And of course You by Ten Sharp, of course our song. That spring was inevitably similar (to my mind, so schematic) to 1989... but also different: she was different and me too. Stars by Simply Red... she had fallen from the stars for me, walking at Colle della Maddalena one evening together. Friday I'm in Love by Cure, light but perfectly fit. Oh, Never mind by Nirvana, which at the time didn’t look like it would be... what I actually was! The sweet and carefree It's a fine day by Opus 3: they were all fine days, at that time! And Are you ready to fly by Rozalla. The sweet Non amarmi by Aleandro Baldi and Francesca Alotta... stupid blockhead that I was, when I was still afraid of losing her. I can’t dance from the reunited Genesis marked the overcoming of the very dark No son of mine which had peeped out at the end of 1991, and... once again I loved Phil Collins, but what a heavy one. Time is a healer, and now my wounds are not the same, hummed Cinzia’s friend showing (oddly enough) that she knew English language.
And the soft Human touch by Bruce Springsteen. Yet the sweet Damn I wish I was your lover by Sophie B. Hopkins, who reminded me (in the name) physicist Stephen Hawking (!)
And Tempo by Jovanotti, danced together to Laura in the famous cinema-turned-to-disco, the Don Carlos… non abboccare a questa grande balla / del tempo che ti fa cambiare che ti modella / e più vai avanti più la vita è meno bella was already so meaningful at the times! And Mare mare from Luca Carboni - gorgeous. And Enrico Ruggeri’s Prima del temporale... quelle facce (those pictures, ndt) siamo noi: so touching, so romantic, he so good in telling a story of a lifetime and time itself... future and past...


Clean Hands (Mani Pulite, ndt) had jumpstarted, as we said, and something was changing... the hope that a fairly rotten place like Craxi’s/Democrazia Cristiana’s Italy or the city of Torino, which had sent away mayor Novelli with false accusations and put in his place some other socialist thieves… could retrieve, it seemed to take shape! Warranty Alerts (a legal device, ndt), villains who committed suicide after being caught in the act (!!), signs saying Grazie Di Pietro (thanks Di Pietro, ndt) on the motorway bridges on my way to Milano: we all wondered how long it would have passed before they would catch the Cinghialone, i.e. the obvious Boss of the Villains, Craxi.
The Northern League had won the elections, and this looked like a good sign. Tomba kept winning and Deborah Compagnoni began to win at his side. Toro football team arrived unbelievably in UEFA Cup final but... various poles, referee’s mistakes and a generic Superga syndrome prevented it from conquering it. Anyways, at least they lost against Ajax, it could be worse!
And Luna Rossa... a boat of which I didn’t know nor have I ever wanted to know anything - and so it was for my friends but, you know, fashions... – sailed into the sea somewhere: I remember those evenings at the pub, everyone watching television. In fact, double-checking, I see that it was not Luna Rossa but the Moro di Venezia. Oh well…
Anyway, Italians couldn’t imagine the monetary storm that would come in September, nor the compulsory levy on bank accounts performed by the legendary Amato, in August.

Eluana Englaro crashes and falls into a coma... and two decades later, her name will remain linked to the need for a law on euthanasia, struggling with the Vatican and various cursed hypocrites.
Scalfaro was elected, freeing us from that sad Sardinian one who had always been Cossiga. And the Mafia shoots out Salvo Lima (not bad) and then Falcone and Borsellino... and you realize that there is a war going on. Oh, some do understand this... some don’t. You know.

Laura and me, united more than ever despite the day that I still... can’t define, i.e. the day after the Simply Red concert at Parco Ruffini...
Yeah, it was so weird: I really loved her so much. And to that concert I had gone alone just... because I liked them and in any case it was a good idea. And I started thinking of so many things... let's say seven years of memories. But nothing serious: and yet, when we met the next day, for some reason I seemed to be far... I remember her voice when she almost starts crying saying (so tenderly) "you’re not even looking into my little eyes anymore..."
Maybe I had used my usual strong colors (!) and maybe I had used them talking about the past in a way that... over the years, I learned to be just mine. It had happened when I spoke of 1985, in the years following it. Then in 1987, in the following years. I can imagine how I appeared to Laura that night.
I apologized with a flower (she appreciated them ;) ) and everything returned to normal: we went on the Garda lake at Easter and... I felt good: in peace with friends, with my past, with my job, with future. Here and there, not with my body... but nothing special. That Laura’s pajamas that I saw in summer and that would have caused to me the usual, irresistible, envy... was yet to come.
Rather, Jon Secada. In a parallel way to Under the bridge by Red Hot Chili Peppers, with which I got to know them in that month of June, it was on the radio Just another day. And in my mind it remained inextricably linked to one afternoon when... Dunno, probably the scared sissy had taken over me. Or maybe it was Cavour, yep - we know well (!)
I don’t remember what had happened before, with the other friends: fact is, at some point I got blue, and I was about to cry... and she asked me what was going on as we moved away alone. I answered her, and I said that I was afraid to lose her, afraid that she could not want me any more: she assured me a thousand times that it wasn’t the case and... I can't resist it's just another day without you / It'd never be the same if you're not here went back to the song.

So, we organized to go camping in Tuscany. Again, yes: but you can’t deny that, except for very rare cases (you know, the Big Fat Wedding  or the people in Pisa...) Tuscany is wonderful. And, okay, I had my own memories... but those with Laura became probably the best ever. Perhaps the way we were dealing with our tent and the menage, perhaps for the fact that I was purchasing L’Indipendente (the newspaper by Feltri when he made sense) and Cuore and... there was no longer just love, but also something that had to do with ideals, politics (but not only). What a wonderful picture, that sunset on the beach behind the hedge... and how beautiful our faces!
All perfect. Except that, at the beach, the idea struck my head that... I would’ve loved to be a female. An idea, yeah: let's say they had been fifteen years since I thought about it: I say on that beach because it was there that I gave birth (!!) to the idea for Mele a metà. A tale that lasted twenty-four years...
And... no, okay, that was not the reason for our drifting apart: simply, as I wrote (again) several times, after we had made love (she used to say it was her first time) ... I lost it all. With a strong sense of guilt because - but it took me decades to understand it - I hated to think of myself so pathetically male down-to-earth...
At the time, I limited myself to think that she was rather flat at her breast. Yes, of course, it could be a little problem... but obviously not to preclude a romance. So, no, simply I didn’t love her anymore: okay, it happens, and since I knew how it had been going on the push and pull in the years with Daniela... I decided that I would’ve left her as soon as possible.
But it wasn’t easy...

Sempre, by Paolo Vallesi, screamed from the car - even if I didn’t think in particular to Laura, but I would’ve liked to. It's probably me by Sting, yeah. And Disappointed by Electronic... just like that, the way I felt (by the way, I found out only recently that this group wasn’t just a spin-off from Pet Shop Boys, rather a real supergroup including Johnny Marr from Smiths and Bernard Sumner of New Order). Rhythm is a dancer, the legendary song by Snap. Elio e le storie tese and their brilliant Servi della gleba... but it made me feel too bad: I was not that one like premi un tasto ed esce lo sfaccimm’ (!) [just push the button and my dick is gonna get ready]
Simple Life and The One from Elton John... that meadow in the Tuscan countryside at sunset... I wanted the one to be Laura, I really wanted it.
After Tuscany, we spent a few days in Ventimiglia, together to the rest of our group of friends: and even among the others we were good, we continued to feel more than good! Here they were the two friends from the census and others and others, including the dolly Cinzia schoolmate to Laura, so nice! There were other nice days, and How do you do by Roxette and a cover of Because the night by Co.Ro. and My body and my soul from Marvin Gardens (on the edge of house music but acceptable) chanted those moments. E Nomi e cognomi by Francesco Baccini, beautiful, perfect and so true and sincere in that year! And the curious C’è in giro un’altra razza from Marco Conidi, with that nice "fanculo" (fuck off, ndt) at one point (!): I didn’t know this singer and I haven’t heard anything from him for decades, but that song on the radio was remarkable. Joy by Soul II Soul... together to Keep on moving from a few years earlier.

In short, there came September and, in fact, the devaluation of lira. As a compensation, Europe as a project progressed, and... that was something. Laura had to start thinking about a job and I went along with my stuff.
Ron’s Non abbiam bisogno di parole, I have always appreciated it. A close friend of the time broke up with his girlfriend when their marriage seemed to be imminent... and so he pushed himself into several blows of life, up to sending his newly bought car upside down. A car from which it had played Entres los tierras by Heroes del Silencio, or Hanno ucciso l’uomo ragno from 883, the hit of summer.

Cinema, bowling, mountain trips... everything was going on and I realized that I had to make clear to Laura that I was not in love anymore, even though it was hurting - even if friends were telling me things like "you want to leave her just because you don’t like her that much? And then you’ll be alone?" (...) So there were again sad songs, like This used to be my playground by Madonna (for me, now in free fall after Vogue and Erotika) or Miserere by Zucchero (with Pavarotti) or Sleeping satellite from Tasmin Archer. And the curious Connected by Stereo MC's with its strange sounds and tunes (as it used to happen in those years) or Would I lie to you by Charles and Eddie.
I remember, in those months, the flourishing of jokes made with audio samplers on the radio... the crazes which easily arose ("Come hai detto che si chiama?" and the like). They were beautiful and they would go on for... forever!

And as Clinton won the election after the warmongering Bush sr., I fell in love...
Yes, the amoeba. Or rather, I would call her amoeba only afterwards: or even earlier, in fact... But now Cinzia, the now former girlfriend of Nicola for almost a year, seemed... perfect for me. In fact, it would take me exactly... twenty-four years and a whole novel to understand it, not so much as my half rather my double. We both had blue eyes and... I, who used to dream of being a woman, I found that the name suited me perfectly. Plus some other facets... not many in fact, but rather apt - at least at that time.
But, of course, in those days I couldn’t admit it... I couldn’t tell anyone and I didn’t even think about it: my fantasies or my stories more or less sci-fi (!) stayed in my mind. So I decided that I was in love with her and that she probably was too, just there had not been a chance to reveal it, in those four years.
On the other hand (what a surprise) she wasn’t. Perhaps, in this case, really came into play the rule that we were too similar. Or maybe, as I thought for at least a decade, when I left Laura (again a November 29th, moreover palindrome...) she cast a spell over me.
In the end, Cinzia simply wasn’t interested into me and - given her background - it was not so hard to understand. I felt rather bad, because in those months... slowly, I began to think about how it would be having a family... I had seen pictures of a wife and children on the desk of a customer in Assago and strangely I had focused on them… more than usual.

Nothing. In early December, she told me she was not interested in me... we decided to remain friends anyway and then it came Christmas and New Year’s Eve when, in her small, Laura actually took revenge - taking a curious jerk as her new boyfriend! Of course it was rather obvious to everyone that it had been a stopgap move, because he... with all due respect (cit.) was a poor demented, starting from his name (!!)
I slept alone in the midst of five couples - should have been six, had been planned and organized well, a month earlier. Oh well…

More than words, in a version from Jovanotti/Carboni was the background to those days. I loved them both, in those days. Along with Man on the Moon by REM, Maudit by Litfiba (yes! Italy was changing! we really believed in that! that much at least) and Dur dur d'etre babe (Jordy) so annoying... although it was original (if I remember correctly, the child was the son or other relative from one of the Rockets!)

Disappointed, Electronics

Mare mare, Luca Carboni

Prima del temporale, Enrico Ruggeri

 1993

Ordinary world and Come Undone from Duran Duran technically belong to 1992, but to me they were out exactly around New Year’s Eve and so...
I found the first one boring and annoying, quite immediately: and the fact that New Year’s days went exactly... how they went, with that eerie and awkward presence represented by that Alessandro my ex’s new purchase... let's say it did create an unpleasant connection (!) to me.
Come undone, however, wasn’t too bad: perhaps a bit too much like My Antarctica and generally saddish... I remember that a few months later, probably in the fall, I saw in a restaurant the Duran Duran performing in some TV show... and that Notorious looked so old... as if decades had passed! And they were quite aged... if I remember correctly, later, in the 2000s, they did give themselves some make-up.

Well, 1992 had ended and... as some wag wrote on a table in the hospital where, now, I was working three days a week, "1992 KO x 1993 OK". I didn’t understand exactly what he meant... I didn’t understand it, say, up to the 2008 crisis, when I imagined that the guy had had some economic problems over the past year. I think, yep (!)
As for me, I made that optimism mine. I couldn’t know that 1992 would have been the last year in which I’d have lived a normal love story, decent...

From the point of view of work, everything was pretty fine: a lot of customers, quite interesting things... a technology that was evolving quickly... And my usual projects continued to advance in parallel with the real work i.e. routine, let's say. The quarrels, to call them so, with my partners had been overcome (or, as they should be called more appropriately, set aside) and we were working a lot... also gaining a nice amount of money! We were usually me and Paolo, and at times some of his collaborators like one of his brothers or even other guys, more or less crooked 
Marco had been toying in his new warehouse for years now and I was going to meet him more or less once a week: especially around summer, I used to listen to Break it down again along the way, the new record by Tears for Fears... it was beautiful, very nice, from start to end.
And in winter? I had been listening to little pleasant things like Beloved’s Sweet harmony or the incredible Problem # 13 by Johnny Dangerous (!!), or more serious ones like If I ever lose my faith in you and Fields of gold by Sting (slightly recovering in my tastes) or Vivere by Vasco Rossi (cute), or The bottle by The Christians. And of course Roxette’s Queen of rain...
Prima guardia from Litfiba, not bad. And Layla by Eric Clapton who had always annoyed me a little... but I liked this one: unfortunately it stays connected to that gross girl I had courted in those first months...
As well as Walking in my shoes by Depeche Mode: I had just recorded it along with the full CD and I spent that Saturday afternoon outside her office waiting for her. Obviously she wasn’t quite the chick that did for me, but I had liked her somehow and... Another night I stopped listening to That's the way love goes by Janet Jackson for almost an hour, after we said goodbye.
Wasted time. Much.

Like that one from a carnival party, the so-called Cristina who gave me a wrong telephone number: I was twenty-six and I should have known certain tricks - and instead I simply couldn’t conceive them. For various reasons…
On the other hand there was Patrizietta, which wasn’t too bad to me: and this feeling was shared, I would say more or less since we had we met in November. Sure, her generic intellectual level wasn’t great; but I would have realized that later (!!) There were never avances from me nor her so... so good: only some dates out, some beer, some small concerts.

Friends began to get married. Oh, they had already begun a few years before (!), but in 1993 there were at least three weddings... the first one, that colleague from my old company, in April. Kd Lang’s Constant Craving... is connected to this memory. The second, a classmate, a former boy-scout, who organized an unconventional wedding and, that day, my auto was playing the new record from T.T. D'Arby of which I remember especially the sweet Delicate (in duet with Des 'ree).
Third was then in summer, and he was our old friend from the group from ‘87, who had recovered the crisis with his chick, and so... And there was Cinzia: dressed in pink, perfect... just a little sulky or better angry, as she seemed to me. Perhaps because she had seen again her former boyfriend (and common friends) publicly after more than a year, or maybe because she couldn’t stand me much.
Yet we had kept in touch... in small doses, in those months: we used to call each other once in a while, we were meeting at times... in a couple of occasions we also went to the mountains with some friends, then once to the sea with two of her improbable vamp friends (!)
I remember what I wrote in the diary the day after the marriage and… rereading it after many years, it was all so very sweet and lovable... but also empathy-like: that is I had imagined how she had felt... and between the lines, I remember how I wanted to dress like her and be her.

Curiously, at the groom's house, a few days before, we had listened to Money by Pink Floyd: I remember it because I barely knew that song... and Leo was determined to show us his amplifier clear audio.
From year 1993, as you can see, I don’t have particularly vivid or important memories: if it’s true that love changes your life (as they sang the Blow Monkeys) lack of love makes it a permanent flatness. In my case, interspersed with small attempts to overcome it... on average, to no avail.
Obvious.

In any case, in those first few months I had been around Piedmont to install my programs, deliver computers...
From a business and economic perspective, I had made one step further: now I was earning even more than before, and the fact that I could manage my time in complete freedom gave me the opportunity to get up in the morning and arrange my day at best: sometimes I slept till late maybe to recover some working night (!), sometimes I was immersed down to my head in some of my projects, other times I would go to various customers and... other times I would go maybe to visit a trade show or various meetings converning in my job/hobby. Well, yes, at least I had achieved this success! I was making exactly what I had dreamed.
I was still going to Milano, quite often: I remember the coincidence (by now you understand that there are no coincidences...) due to which on February 9th I was on the highway when a bus caught fire and it took five hours to reach for my destination (and I didn’t have a mobile phone). February 9th was the birthday of my former girlfriend from one year before... see, the evil eye?!

Also, in spring, I devoted myself for what I can consider the last time to a video game... spending hours on it! It was Wolfenstein 3D, the Nazi-hunting, pseudo-3D and... exciting, yes! Besides, PCs were becoming serious business... Windows was almost beginning to work (!) and so...
I've been wrongly messing up Dreamlover by Mariah Carey with her Fantasy hit from two years later. Hence I'll get back on this later.

Summer came, anyway, and we decided to go to London: there were eight of us, the old group from 1987 and... well, we were getting along rather well. Some signs of… getting grumpy were beginning to show but, oh well, nothing too serious.
I was always looking for Brighter day, as she sang Taleesa with Stefano Secchi, making up a beautiful cover of Una storia importante by Ramazzotti.
Then, in late August, I spent a few days camping on the Adriatic coast together with some other guys from that group and some from the two friends of the census and other friends of theirs: I don’t remember much... except some time in the discos, but I’ve never loved those clubs too messy. And some days at the beach, a few photos. I had no problem with money but... it was hard to spend it in a satisfactory way. Well, maybe, had I been a true Latin male it would have helped...

And in those clubs it was played Haddaway’s What is love, of course! Beautiful, beautiful, were it not for the sadistic irony of its title. And Delusa, a remix from Vasco. And then the Articolo 31 with Tocca qui which... sincerely... Not long before, in the spring trips, I had listened to Radio Baccano from Gianna Nannini and Jovanotti, pretty and well designed; and Non ho più la mia città by Geraldine Trovato... well, at the time I did like her (over the years I would have called her a Carmen Consoli’s draft!); and Non c’è by Laura Pausini (sad... and anyway La solitudine wasn’t that much better); Regret by New Order and 29 Palms by an almost posthumous Robert Plant; Runaway train from Soul Asylum; and of course Stupendo by Vasco Rossi. Life provides irony and sadism, we agreed on this...
Antonella, the smaller of the two friends, liked the Vernice - the guy with a disfigured face (!) who sang Su e giù. Well, and how could we not mention Masini’s Vaffanculo! And then the nice Chiara by Rats or also Passerà from Aleandro Baldi, who won Sanremo's festival following previous year's good placement: and it's worth remembering that finiremo tutti in banca prima o poi (we'll all end up working for a bank sooner or later), quite fit for Nicola who started working for a famous italian bank in those months, and was proud of saying things like "finally I'm earning tons of money". Strange, because in the end he never looked like they were a poor family...

Meanwhile, the bombs rained... in Italy: Rome, Florence... And also the notices issued by the Clean Hands Pool: Craxi, Andreotti, others... At least the hope of... a little cleaning up stayed strong, although precisely those bombs were not a good omen. Ah, they had also arrested the mythological Toto Riina, but... I don’t know why, this story didn’t convince me much.
If nothing else, the Toro football club had won Italian Cup! Unglaublich but true! Ah, maybe I hadn’t mentioned that, but... in 1990 I had been in Yugoslavia: take a look at what happened to Tito & c. in subsequent years…!!

Still in summer we should remember Nord sud ovest est from 883: really nice, and in practice from then on I could never stand them... anymore
And Il battito animale by Raf, and Gabrielle’s Dreams, and The River of Dreams by Billy Joel, and What's Up by 4 Non Blondes (and another trip in Liguria and commenting its final stanza, which resembles Don’t worry be happy, as noted by a guy) and All that she wants from Ace of Base. Two princes by Spin Doctors, I only discovered it years later.

Nothing else. By the end of the year I was again looking for ideas...: the old group was now virtually completely made of couples and the few ones remaining were… recyclable (!) and I, frankly, felt I was a little better than them (!!). Oh right, let's not forget Loredana (aka Loredalla), known one day in July... a friend of the famous two girls and by them sponsored: of course, even if she was pretty enough (and with a beautiful dress hanging in camp), her level was very low and it all became clear after a few days (years later I would’ve noticed the fact that she had a very small head circumference and this, like they say, had its own importance!)
She went then married to one of them, I would say "adequate" to her, so everything ok.

In February, third of February to be precise, I had set foot in a neighborhood gym invited by Antonella’s (one of the two friends from 1991) boyfriend. He was a good guy, Davide, and although we had met only a few times, there was a good relationship between us: so he had invited me to go and play with him... but the nice thing is that no one seemed to know him in the gym! So, past the initial moments, they told me to play without thinking too much... and since then, every week, I joined them.
With the arrival of summer we used to spend some more time in the evening at the pub or in the ice-cream parlor, but nothing more.
In the fall I decided to join their group even beyond the volleyball matches: timidly I went in search of the elusive school where they used to meet and I became a member of their group and... at least one right thing from that year came out!

Baccini was singing Ho voglia di innamorarmi - correctly. And Phil Collins’ Both sides: I have a memory of this song while I go meet that chick in Piossasco… another questionable and country-like chick, who was going after me...
They came Nirvana too with Heart shaped box: no, it was autumn and then everything a bit gloomy... I began to go out with those new friends... there were several subgroups and, at least in the first phase, I found myself with those... the singles. Pretty logical. That these corresponded to those who played no volleyball, was less logical but oh well. That they were also the least crafty or smart... I would have picked this up only after a short time and this desire to switch level followed me for years to come.
The two most famous sisters plus an acquired one ... and for some reason really hard to understand, I fell in love with one of them. When, later, someone would ask me how come you liked Patrizia... I would candidly answer well, you see, she was born exactly six days before Daniela, an ex-girlfriend of mine...
No, I wasn’t able yet to tame Time. Or my brain. Or my brain together with time (!)
However it wasn’t just her date of birth: that girl was the typical shy one who was possibly really gifted and talented. Possibly, precisely: because in reality I realized pretty quickly that she wasn’t so. Apart from her breasts, I mean 

I courted her tactfully for a couple of months... the usual wasted rose and then nothing. At New Year’s Eve she was there too, yes, wearing her black dress so old-lady style... and I elegantly worth a better cause... in the home of those four idiots enriched by mistake from Giaveno. Ooops, sorry, I was wrong to say four (!!!)

Never mind: foundations were laid for... so many things, and the evening passed in the end pretty quickly. It took away Come mai from the 883 (as well as all my respect for Max Pezzali) that had been dedicated in some way to this last girl with a tooth-of-judgment sore on December 30th... and also Sì che non sei tu from Audio 2 (cloners of Battisti), and I'd do anything for love by Meat Loaf.
But I won’t do that, precisely.

Meanwhile, some genius started to throw rocks from the overpass on the highway. Every year, or maybe every day, some idiot wakes up on this planet and... (!!!!)


But I was again forgetting the U2!! In July I even went to watch their concert in Torino (the one with Bono calling Agnelli on the phone...) and I really liked Zooropa, containing Lemon and many others! It’s funny, in the end I see that U2 were always there in the background but... without ever meaning something really significant. Apart precisely One, Lemon, and a few others.


I just found, thanks to the usual radio (!) Black by Pearl Jam... very nice!

Lemon, U2

Runaway train, Soul Asylum

Stupendo, Vasco Rossi