Il Sogno Del Marinaio: La Busta Gialla
Il Sogno del Marinaio is Mike Watt, of Minutemen, fIREHOSE, and Stooges fame (and lots more besides), and two young gentlemen of Verona and Bologna, Stefano Pilia and Andrea Belfi. I can’t believe that Watt ever sleeps, given his proliferating collaborations, podcasts, and side-projects, but this is one of the most consistently exciting bands he’s put together for a while. Pilia and Belfi are very gifted musicians, and the whole thing gels as if they’ve been playing together forever (which they haven’t, it was recorded in two days).
What does it sound like? A mix, largely but not entirely instrumental; you could call some of it post-rock (both Tortoise-like and gloomier), like the eight minute opening track, ‘Zoom’. There are jazzier moments, like ‘Punkinhead Ahoy!’, and more experimental passages, like ‘Messed-Up Machine’. Since everything appears to be ‘prog’ these days, there might be some of that too. ‘Il Guardiano Del Faro’, one of the quieter pieces, is beautiful. Here’s ‘Partisan Song’:
And ‘Punkinhead Ahoy!’ because it cheers me up.