"In joy and anger, in destroying the cage... there is, there is, yes
there is!" sang Gianfranco Manfredi in "Ma chi ha detto che non c'è" atthe beginning of '77. In addition to remembering him through this quote
from one of his most famous songs, we reiterate this choice of title to
critically address the theme of prison through music. Five years after
the riots that took place on March 8, 2020, the need for a liberated
world, even from prisons, has certainly not diminished, a world that
songs like Gianfranco's can help us imagine. Three very different and
"distant" songs tell us about life behind bars, in the prisons of the
Bel Paese.
1 FABRIZIO DE ANDRÈ - IN MY HOUR OF FREEDOM
2 5th BRACKET - NEVER AGAIN TORTURE
3 SERPE IN SENO - TUESDAY
1 FABRIZIO DE ANDRÉ - IN MY HOUR OF FREEDOM
Fabrizio De André's songs seem to be immortal, certainly for his voice,
perhaps for his refined musical choices, but also for his approach to
colossal themes and individual life stories. The Genoese
singer-songwriter has signed indelible pacifist and antimilitarist hymns
and in his verses emerge outcasts of all sorts and from all over. The
closeness to the "saints without God" shows a "romantic" vision of
anarchism, which did not remain only a cultural influence but often
translated into support for the press and anarchist initiatives.
In 1973 De André published "Storia di un impiegato", a concept album
that offers a personal reading of 1968. The album tells the story of a
very ordinary employee, a figure without a precise class affiliation,
who through mistakes and reflections understands that only a shared
struggle can truly change things. The final piece of the album is "Nella
mia ora di libertà", to date one of the "classics" of political songs.
Also thanks to unexpected covers such as the punk one by Gavroche or the
interpretation at Sanremo 2022 by Giovanni Truppi who, together with
Mauro Pagani and Vinicio Capossela, brought it to Rai1 with Gogliardo
Fiaschi's red-black heart pinned on his chest.
"I don't want to breathe the same air / as a prison guard / so I decided
to give up / my hour of freedom", says the iconic incipit of the song,
also taken up by the ultras world.
"They taught us wonder / towards people who steal bread / now we know
that it is a crime / not to steal when you are hungry". In De André's
verses, the prisons inhabited by proletarians emerge, poor devils forced
to steal by a life of hunger and deprivation. From '68 onwards, the
presence of political prisoners will begin to consolidate, who will mix
and drag the "common" prisoners into a long and profitable season of
struggles. Only towards the end of the song does the protagonist speak
in the plural, overcoming the individual revolt of the beginning,
opening up to a mass revolt, among equals moved by common needs. "We
don't want to breathe the same air / as the prison guards / we have
decided to imprison them / during their hour of freedom". "Nella mia ora
di libertà" together with "La domenica delle salme" remains one of
Faber's most political and explicit songs, which in the conclusion takes
up "Canzone del Maggio", which sounds terribly current: "Per quanto voi
vi crediate assolti / sei lo nessuno voluto comprende" (As much as you
believe yourself to be absolved / you are involved anyway).
2 5° BRACCIO - MAI PIÙ TORTURE
5° Braccio were among the agitators of the very first Italian punk of
the Eighties. The band remained active only for 1982, some of them would
later be part of other hc legends from Turin such as Negazione,
Contratto and Panico. They were the ones who introduced among the first
cries of punk in Italian numerous songs on the repression of police,
military and religious power, and therefore also on prisons. "Mai più
tortura" focuses on the torture perpetrated inside the repressive places
par excellence, explicitly becoming an "act of denunciation against
torture to prisoners detained in our jails". The song is one of the
group's most iconic, so much so that it is the only one recorded on
vinyl in the compilation "Papi, Queens, Reichkanzlers & Presidennti"
released in 1982 by Attack Punk Records. 5° Braccio then released many
songs in various compilations on cassette, but it was not until 2007
that they could listen to their complete works on CD, "Blackout a
Torino" published by "E.U. '91 Produzioni". The choice of the band's
name was born in reaction to the massive incarcerations of the early
1980s that affected the movement and not only, with reference to the
part of the prison reserved for political prisoners, as they themselves
reveal in an interview reported in full on the DVD "Punx. Creatività e
rabbia" published by Shake with a rich booklet. In their songs there are
still many slogans "Mai più tortura nelle galere / mai più tortura nelle
galere", but this does not mean they are sterile and inconclusive. The
lucidity and promptness of their denunciation, not only towards
dictatorial regimes, but precisely towards countries that proclaim
themselves "democratic", "Torture is also in Italy not only in El
Salvador / torture is also in Italy not only in Argentina". The text
therefore remains current since Italy does not even have a serious law
on torture but, as a champion of the West, has no problem dispensing
certificates of civilization and humanity in the world. The text refers
to explicit treatments, "Discharges to the genitals, liters of water and
salt, needles under the nails, regular beatings / legalized democratic
torture on tortured and kidnapped political prisoners", in the early 80s
you can still feel the recrudescence against the struggles that arose in
the previous decade.
3 SERPE IN SENO - TUESDAY
Serpe In Seno have been pushing their two-voiced rap in the vein of
"Kill the rich or die tryin" for more than 10 years, mocking the vulgar
and materialistic "Get rich or die tryin", a precept of gangsta rap made
in the USA. They were among the very first, within underground and
militant hip hop, to overflow beyond the fences of the "old school"
stylistic features in "L'isola di Pasqua dell'universo", a watershed of
the genre in its own small way. Since 2016 they had shown how it was
possible to wink at trap and styles distant from posse or old school,
while keeping the social content and a precise political orientation
clear and explicit. "New sneakers and yet you have to go", to use their
own words. We will have to wait until 2022 to hear new hits, danceable
but scorching and explosive. With new sounds, Serpe In Seno know how to
claim humble origins: "Understand where I come from if you look at my
father's hands", and they continue to rail against the mafia-delinquent
myths of the new rappers, claiming political paths in their hip hop, in
lines like "Vantati se la fai franca, mica se ti arrestano" or "Hai 20 K
al collo, beh io li faccio di benefit".
"Martedì" is a song that talks about prison with a particular
perspective and in which the group's sensitivity towards certain issues
emerges. "I get in line at the parcel check / I empty my pockets in the
lockers, / gypsy ladies stand tall on their heels / they respond in kind
against the agents / [...] I arrive at the High Security department /
already looking like I'm drunk". The second day of the week turns out to
be the one dedicated to visits for people detained in the Roman prison.
Specifically, the song turns out to be a love song. "Today is Tuesday,
interview day / I arrive outside Rebibbia dressed up like Rocky, / I
would like to kiss you, bite your earlobes / but there are too many eyes
around, you have to be sober". In the chorus they quote a famous love
song, "Je pense à toi" by Amadou & Mariam, "Je pense à toi, mon amour,
ma bien aimée [I think of you, my love, my beloved]". But in the next
verse they introduce a reference to imprisonment, absent in the song by
the musicians originally from Mali, "ne m'abandonnes pas en tant que j
suis en captivité [don't abandon me, while I'm in prison]". So perhaps
"Tuesday" manages to talk about the daily life of those who are detained
and how repression works, but it also shows the affection brought inside
the walls. The rhymes become a gesture of love that does not abandon
itself to resignation and isolation. "60 minutes are always too few /
the mail that arrives in fits and starts, / I hope that with a letter
from me / the censorship office will cut their wrists".
En.Ri-ot
https://umanitanova.org/di-respirare-la-stessa-aria-dei-secondini-non-ci-va-note-bandite-nel-distruggere-la-gabbia/
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