Critic's evaluation
It hits the market five years after its predecessor, All The Seasons Of The Day. As the second album by Tommaso Varisco, a composer from Chioggia, Italy, it is sold as a product rich in Nordic European energies. These Gloves was recorded at Botteghe Barranco and Banhoff studios.
The scenery is inland. The landscape and its aroma are of a bucolic nature that is adorably contagious in its freshness of natural purity. There is no industrial interference or mass gatherings, just the sky, the woods and a touch of the sertão. Even so, as attractive as the climate is, its horizon brings with it a strange melancholy that embraces the listener without difficulty. This scenario is built up through the guitar strumming to the point where it resonates in a cozily deep way, while a voice with an equally striking timbre enters the scene in an apparently downcast interpretation. It's Tommaso Varisco delivering, between overlays of children's voices and birdsong carefully placed in the background, as if they were a distant sound, an introspective, melancholic and mournful feel. However, when the harmony begins to reach a crescendo with the delicate entry of Lorenzo Mazzilli's drums and an interesting synchrony between guitar and acoustic guitar, Tehri proves to be a touching and infectious folk song. With its aesthetic simplicity, which also includes the distinctive sound of Luca Swanz Andriolo's banjo, adding even more sertanejo touches to the melody, the song has a mystical lyrical structure as it presents a character learning and having the courage to deal with delicate issues that, for a long time, have been neglected or simply denied. In this respect, therefore, Terhi is like a song of overcoming, of coping, but also of pain and suffering.
She presents herself in a delicate, sweet and gentle way, like a child asking permission to enter an unknown environment. From the melody extracted from Andrea Sambo's violins, you don't just perceive the purity, subtlety and adorable honesty of her immaturity, but compassion. The affection. Caring. Fresh and transcendentally beautiful, the landscape of which is like a summer rain that can awaken the most beautiful rainbow and make it reflect among the flowing veils of water, the song is filled with the soft tinkling of the piano notes combined with the soft rattle of Matteo Dall'Aglio's rattle and the boomy groove of Alessandro Arcuri's bass, creating its rhythmic beat. Touching, emotional and sentimental, Every Moment Has Its Color is an adorably romantic song that surprisingly highlights the uncertainties, fears and insecurities that love can awaken. Nevertheless, it is a sincere song that tries to encourage the listener to connect with the other person so that, from that moment on, they are in the right frame of mind to see the colors of love.
The electric guitar is sneaky, but without any trace of cynicism or deceptive impulses. After all, with its soft, slightly rolling stride, it sounds like the sun appearing from behind the arid mountains of a desert that covers the American west. Surprising the most unsuspecting of ears, a harmonica invades the scene with its undulating howl that echoes through the environment like the croaking of an eagle resonating through the rocky walls of this dry setting. As life begins to happen and the sunlight quickly evaporates the slightest trace of nighttime freshness, the melody takes hold like perfect Tennessee folk, albeit with a deliberately slower rhythmic tempo. It's curious how Lost Souls manages, through its melody, to draw a fixed and guiding landscape that, here, is like the morning twilight accompanying the entire narrative. A plot that ranges from a lack of belonging and motivation to the need for a utopian world governed by a general sense of peace to soothe hearts anguished by the idea that to feel is to suffer from inner emptiness and purposelessness.
The dawn arrives gentle, soft and with a warmth from the sun. While the horizon is governed by pastel and purplish tones that suggest a mix between the soft and the mystical, an echoing voice appears as an omnipresent character suggesting an unconscious and reflective dialog. No wonder that, going against any idea of the plot suggested by its title, Children Song is a socially urgent work that represents all the fear and despair of these little souls who have not yet fully developed, but are already subjected to severe experiences. This song is a delicate folk song that contrasts with an immediate, harsh dialog that exposes a sense of orphaned compassion and encouragement that is viscerally painful for anyone who ventures to interpret it.
The light is dim and illusory. The little that is clear is nothing more than the manipulation of the unconscious itself as a desperate measure to maintain a sense of lucidity and rationality. There is, in fact, a sense of tension in the air, but along with it, the listener can also perceive refinements of a false sense of comfort amidst the gloom. This is the scenario offered by the solitary, sharp and cynical guitar in the way its echoing riff resonates, punctually and linearly. When Varisco comes up with a lyrical interpretation that suggests drunkenness, the structure remains linear in its rigid and downcast essence until the surprising happens. In the chorus, Kittila unveils her dramatic silhouettes while the singer is accompanied by a high-pitched, delicate vocal that, coming from Tin Sky, helps to create a weeping, suffering bias that is amplified by the tearful, lamenting overflight of Linda Varagnolo's cello. Kittila matures, then, as a song of nostalgic pain that highlights sentimental dependence, while at the same time highlighting how loneliness can bring madness to an individual who lacks not only love, but happiness, satisfaction and vivacity.
The synchronous combination of banjo, guitar and harmonica is ecstatic. Soft, cheerful, sweet and floral, the introductory melody is a generous and polite attraction that makes the listener feel at ease and comfortable to enter the imaginary environment it proposes. The sky is not sunny, but its setting tone is encouraging, full of compassion and motivation. From the freshness that comes with dusk, sugar becomes comfortably nostalgic and melancholic, as the serene melody draws delicate folk contours. To Move On is a gentle song that deals with an individual not only in the process of mourning the end of a relationship, but also looking for ways to overcome heartache, while following the path of destiny. No wonder its melody is like sitting on top of a hill watching the sun set over the sea with tears in your eyes at the images of an enchanting past that the unconscious never tires of replaying.
The trench is silent. However, there are watchful eyes hidden between the barricades that protect against the enemy at a close distance. Sweat runs cold down my forehead, but my hands are steady on my weapons. Suddenly, a gunshot-like sound cuts through the silence echoing across the inhospitable vastness. As time passes, this idea fades away and takes the form of a funeral march that is dominated by the crashing drums and the introspective symmetry of Mazzilli's guitars. A soft breeze, but with a curiously melancholic character, Song Of Joy calmly evolves towards a Celtic aesthetic through the combination of textures between the polite sweetness of Stella Burns' piano and the acoustic guitar. This sound gives the song a reflective vein while, through Varisco's husky voice, the dialogue provides the listener with the imagery of a scenario governed by a reenergizing and motivational sunlight. Under the synergy of Linda Nordio's backing vocals, Song Of Joy becomes adorably delicate, a detail that contrasts with a strangely morbid plot. After all, in this song the narrator explores a mature but hopeless awareness of his relationship with his loved one. More than just a song about overcoming, Song Of Joy flirts with Scorpions' Winds Of Change, in its approach to war and the insane desire to escape the suffering that the war scenario creates in society. That's why Song Of Joy sounds like morphine against the pain of not only physical loss, but also the emotional loss of people who have been deeply wounded by the guerrilla context.
The guitar grows gradually and politely, like the sun coming out from behind the mountains and giving the dormant scenery the light that brings the arrival of a new opportunity. That brings and makes life happen. Minimalist and delicate in its folk structure, the title track, from the lyrical interpretation, embodies a contagious nostalgic energy. Almost like an interlude, the track is a way for the character to keep in touch with the memories not only of a deeply happy experience, but of a person who completed him in every way. It's almost like a farewell song. It's a testament to the awareness of what's no longer coming back and the maturity to move on with life, while maintaining an affectionate relationship with the memories of the past.
Soft and fresh like a winter's sunset on a deserted Nordic beach, the new atmosphere is soon structured around a contagiously bluesy base, but whose instrumentation is dominated by a groove on the edge between the corpulence and stridency of the bass, which follows in a linear undulation alongside the drums. When the guitar comes in with its howls that sound like a sudden breeze that makes the curtains of the ajar window sway, the song also starts to offer curious indie rock refinements in the midst of its melodic recipe. This is how Pic From A Plane, with its mostly acoustic silhouette, proposes a duet between Varisco and Tin whose essence exudes not only the memories of a love that has been reciprocated, but the joy of a future in which that same reciprocity will be intensely relived through a generous dose of nostalgia for each other's company. A process of memories and desires experienced only by the trigger of a photo seen during a flight.
Nearing its last breaths, These Gloves surprises the listener with In The Forest, an interlude filled with improvisation and spontaneity. Between the wind chimes, the members of the album chat and laugh in a relaxed way, suggesting to the listener a friendly atmosphere. Of friendship.
The squeaks continue in the new environment as a new way of drawing the silhouette of silence. Here, this ingredient doesn't just want to bring something ambient, but to impart something definitively sonorous, a texture to add to the melodic context. This is how lo-fi is used as an opener to this unprecedented scenario. When the listener is already intoxicated and hypnotized by the emptiness, Varisco appears, breaking the silence with his characteristically hoarse and torn timbre. The guitar accompanies him like an old companion. An element that, as well as immersing the sound in a soft melancholy, brings a fresh, saddened sweetness. In the same vein as the introduction, Last Time remains mostly minimalist in its exploration of delicacy with few textures until, close to its last shreds of consciousness, it awakens in a sudden rush of adrenaline when the harmonica emerges with a curiously soft cry, interestingly velvety in its sweet stridency and amplifying the sensitive character that transports the listener to a place of pleasantly bucolic essence. With this sound, Last Time, a lean folk song, provides a surprising lyricism in its reflective proposal, starting from the clipping of the moment of passage between earthly and spiritual life, about what will be missed the most. It could be a mother's kiss and hug. The city lights. The passionate looks and touches. Last Time is where the touching meets the morbid, the nostalgic and the melancholic. Where ultra-romanticism meets delicacy and the desire to leave a legacy of love that awakens in the other the longing for the days that will no longer be experienced.
There is a belief that in order to make something great, especially in music, you need many elements, creating several layers, to make each product epic, touching and amazingly magnificent. However, there are those who believe that even with little, these same results can be achieved. With These Gloves, Tommaso Varisco has not only relied on aesthetic minimalism, but has also proposed poignant and urgent dialogues that boldly counter the idea that folk only suggests delicacy in its entirety.
In fact, the melodies on the album are far too serene. However, in the midst of this softness, which often hypnotizes and intoxicates the listener, there is drama, urgency, awareness, reflection and maturity. There is the need to reflect on human emotions and their needs.
Among its 11 chapters, These Gloves manages to impart romanticism in most of the lyrical contexts to give interestingly amorphous colors amid the dense and acidic proposals of its plots. With even ultra-romanticism as the basis for some of the dialogues, Tommaso Varisco uses sound to talk about the absence of belonging, longing, love and gratitude.
Overcoming, songs of social urgency and sentimental dependence are also among the themes Varisco proposes to fill the lyrical content of his new album. And to help him create a sound skeleton capable of representing each of the emotions intended by such storylines, the singer teamed up with a good team of musicians who were able to capture each emotional essence.
That's when Varisco, Mazzilli and Dall'Aglio came into synch. As well as being part of the creative department, the professionals were also responsible for the technical side, especially the mixing. Perhaps because of this detail, or not, the trio managed to ensure that each song had a personality that was easily noticeable to the listener based on the emotions that transpired from them. This is how simple, overwhelmingly folk music became dramatic, melancholic, nostalgic, long-suffering and romantic when combined with indie rock.
Rounding off the technical scope is the cover artwork. Also signed by Varisco, it borrows a similar idea from the photography by Richard Beland and Kevin Estrada used to cover Nickelback's album All The Right Reasons. Despite being in black and white, the photography for These Gloves doesn't hide its whitish gray monochronism. With the help of an empty Nordic road, it exudes melancholy, an idea that serves as the basis of the album's entire melodic-lyrical plot, but also the idea of movement, of constancy. Of overcoming.
Released on 01/20/2024 in an independent way, These Gloves is a folk album with an audacious minimalist aesthetic that gives each track its own persona. An album where romanticism merges with melancholy and nostalgia. An album that makes you think, cry, love. To remember. An album that has done a lot with little.
