mellotronic strategies > marco lucchi

we could be listening to a futurist soundtrack of a dystopian science fiction film, or simply go back to the questions of veracity, what is actual, new or old, what is being, who is human, what is human (philip k. dick comes to mind, obviously.) i wonder if this recording is a pastiche of tricks imitating the old themes of the past, including the trickery of vinyl crackling, tape hiss – if it is low-fi on purpose, if it is build on the side of nostalgia, instrument by instrument layer, building a wall of memorabilia and easy references – i wonder if this ‘mell(ow)tron’ is a voyage into the past to gather easy recognisance of fellow musicians – i even thought that this is a pastiche of...

well, i was wrong. this is a true recording, spanning themes/sounds from the past, with recognisable references, but it is not of an imitating nature, it is not even a pastiche of things past and much less an abominable appropriation of others’ composer’s materials. i walked today by the river thames in richmond listening to this ‘soundtrack’ on my zune, on repeat mode. the fact is that lucchi’s music becomes personal to me, as i presume it is for him, and i appropriate it with jealousy and admiration. good jealousy, by the way, that jealousy that makes me open my ears to listen even better and deeper, that jealousy i confuse with curiosity and that words do not know how to express. so i sat by the water and the words hidden in ‘mell(ow)tron’ seemed to peek out and awakening, just for me. the fact that i do not know many things about marco lucchi makes my listening more private and open. i know he is a founder and member of the orchestra eccletica e sincretista, a superb worldwide band/project (check them on myspace or click on the link on the right); that he is italian, that we can listen to his music on facebook and soundcloud, but of the person, of the artist i know nothing (which i like most – i know, i know, just go to the internet, blah, blah, blah...) obviously, what i can jot, rushing, is my opinion and solely mine. it is a process that doesn’t happen often, one appropriating others’ work and build a universe around it, a very personal world dictated by someone’s compositions and rules. interestingly the last time that happened the process was the very same – i was suspicious of the artist’s intentions and artifices and, the case was/is manafon by david sylvian, i really didn’t like it (and i heard it the best way possible. as with ‘mell(ow)tron’ at first hearing, manafon seemed intentionally arrogant and ready to shock, in a bad way – that is, i thought sylvian’s approach to improvisation with master jazz musicians was a show off, ‘here i am, all avant-garde and i do what i want the way i want and i don’t care what you think of it, i am i’, kind of thing. in the case of lucchi it is slightly different. i am not bombarded by reviews of his new work on magazines and newspapers, like sylvian was (and the reviews were not that good!) which makes me think, once again, if the personal life and persona of the artist is as important as the work of art – which, i insist, is not. the curious fact about ‘mell(ow)tron’ is that you can have a peek at the composer’s life on ‘she kisses me (ode to mellotron)’ (if it is, indeed, the artist! i don’t have a clue!) – the same happened with sylvian’s ‘manafon’ with its rough lyrics stories (like a sophisticated travelling minstrel.) here, on ‘she kisses me...’ a voice (lucchi’s?) guides us through what i imagine his own studio and give us a tour of the mellotron (per se a museum piece?) the female voice, the flutes... all accompanied by acoustic guitars that flow in improvised segments, sometimes slightly distorted, filled with melody. the male voice is surrounded by segments of children sneezing, clapping their hands, wind... mesmerising, true and needed.

i do like lucchi’s approaching tactics and compositional methods – they are revivalist, in a way, of a certain kind(s) of recordings i used to listen, and it is a bit en vogue with the low-fi d.i.y. punk spirit that emerges once in a while. the fact is that ‘mell(ow)tron’ is easily distinguishable from other, as good, composers (calling him composer is not in vain.) the too loud vinyl crackling in some tracks, the ‘analogue’ sound with the referred tape hiss is nothing but reminiscent of other eras, of other memories, that are, of course, reminiscent, but that gives the whole album a charm and a sonorous glory, an aura of retro-chic, but immensely improved and authentic, as well the akusmatic/field recordings inserted inside the compositions. the vinyl crackle becomes false memories (again philip k. dick springs to memory, what is real, what is a memory?) , possibly more truer than my own: old 75 rpm’s gyrating, the needle scouring the disc, augmented, possessive of silent movies, valentino, psychadelica, blade runner... as i started this scribbling, we could be travel in time without moving (as i did). possibly i am completely wrong, and you know what? i really do not care.

the litanies (1 to 4) are pieces of an independence from the rest of the album, for me. the first one evolves from melodic piano, guitars/synths, to an experiment of echoes and manifestations, to a minimalistic ritual of impressive maturity. the second litany could be taken out of a bad recording of someone rehearsing the piano(s) – vinyl crackling, chopped pianos of metallic diversions undulating in a sea of static (reminds, actually, of some of the writing of william s. burroughs, static a.m. radios filtering the night, piercing the convulsing plastic...) but lyrically near the fantastic compositions of harold bud and brain eon (that’s a compliment, by the way.) the third litany regresses to the good memory of frippertronics and reversed tapes so dear of the experimentalists (starting with stockhausen) but it is immersed on a ghost-like spiral of deviant reversed pianos, melody and all. the fourth litany is full of distortion, disjointed, apparently unmelodic. the effect is scary, really, and haunting, lines of little flutes on the right channel, scraps of rasping (and reversed) bells, bits of analogue lines, resembling a distorted madrigal or shepherd’s grumping lullaby (anacreonte smiles and washes his hands in the stream...)

the track ‘moon-soon’ opens the album, and it works, for me, as a mark for what will come. a mellotron (!?) line over some crackling light slow beat gives space to a twinkling rusty piano, and then the mellotron lines multiply again. simple, elegant, sinuous and slightly repetitive. the little horns decorate the bruitage in a kind of onomatopoeia, the ‘old’ pianola recurs as if edited, chopped, childlike and, it seems, important for itself, that is, the melody is interchangeable, agreeably, in a short soundtrack that could have been written by a poet to the moon, that are best friends, echoing each other’s dreams. ‘parva ars’ follows, and it is an entretenimento of joyous filigree, an organ multiplies its lines in a little delicious cacophony that at times resembles a fugue of bachian tones, rich, multifaceted and, once again, a simplicity that reminds of that question: why no one else done this before? ‘parva ars’ has the sweetness of re-invention (in the best of ways.) ‘nuvola bimbo’ is a slow paced little wonder. it is impossible to not compare it to other ‘electronica’ pieces, but i will avoid it. the piece is a cornucopia of delights, the percussive melody, the synths perambulating with enoesque precision and the small silences are just there when you do not expect, calm, precious. a lonely piano note observes from the distance, there is an orientalish candour and suddenly all is illuminated with a twist on the soft percussive melody, finishing all too soon...

‘mellow’ is a gem and ends the album (see below, marco lucchi comment on the track.) the mirrors reflect in waves of a soft lullaby (very charmingly resembling to the good days of the durutti column) on the piano, tiny. the mellotron comes with a whispered new line enlacing in between the echoed twinkling piano.

‘last summer’ is a monster of twenty one minutes ten seconds length! it is a giant of a melting pot of percussions, acoustic guitars (ukulele, banjo, mandolin?), looped electronics and treated voices. ‘last summer’ simmers for almost three minutes and then, suddenly and discreetly, a flute, another melody, arpeggios, repetition à la steve reich... spoken word in german! a melisma of voices, and the tempo urges up, just to end again. inventive, recitative of other musics than european, the flute returns... there is a segment here with early glass’ tones that works wonders.

at second and third (4th and 5th) listening ‘mell(ow)tron’ graces the imagination with small surprises and the music grows, in the tradition of the great melody creators. what started as an exercise of déjà vu, on my part there is, ends up to stick to its principles and autonomy, a piece of itself, for itself, by itself. surely this will be a collector’s item (if only i had access to a printed/material version of the album, i think, but that’s nostalgic, is it not?) yes, i bought the album. i listen to it, which rarely happens my own nowadays. an anti-haste piece, savour with time. utterly well produced, ingenious and inventive.

and the composer, mister lucchi wrote of the above review: what can i say? i thank you very very much. you are in my music and in my intentions in a very profound way. you see and you hear me and my music. i'm really happy. grazie. (20 april 2010) :¬}

marco lucchi comments on his new album: mello(w)tron is a mature work of a mature man. a mellow work of a mellow man. i pay an hommage to my favorite instrument, the mellotron. i consider it my "totem" instrument, the first one (and maybe the best one) who started up my imagination in music. how much i love(d) its acid and mellow sound... in this cd i reworked some seminal works of mine (moon-soon and nuvola bimbo), i sampled a couple of work on my new loop-machine (parva ars and a baby loop), i compiled a suite of tracks on a simple piano arpeggio (the four litanies) previously released by webbed hand records, i remixed sounds and musics by other musicians (in she kisses me the fonts are a track by jan grunfeld and a youtube presentation of kind of mellotron, in last summer the fonts are terry riley and witthuser&westrupp). at the end of the release mellow is a reinterpretation of a track by aphex twin. as you can see, mello(w)tron is a collection of antiques and curios....

and here is what we found about marco lucchi (in his own words): i started to play music when i was a child, when i was 8 - i played drums, guitar and bass guitar in some "beat" groups (all my life was and is dedicated in making groups, as a musician or as a teacher...) - we played Rolling Stones, Beatles, Them, Yardbirds, Animals, Who - but i also listened to classical music - my mother played accordion and piano, and she was (still is) very fond of Chopin, my uncle played trombone - my father was (and still is) very fond of Beethoven and symphonic music - my brother was the pop one and he gave me music by Donovan, Vanilla Fudge, Steppenwolf, Electric Prunes - so i grew up (and still i am) between classical and pop music - when i was a teen i began to listen to prog rock, to art rock, to psycheledic rock, to kraut rock, to jazz rock, and started to study oboe in the local Conservatory - at the same time i started to play so many instruments (violin, cello, mandolin, recorders, flute, keyboards, ethnic devices) and formed two groups - both were acoustic - the first one was "à la" Incredible String Band - we were four (like them) - 2 boys, two girls (like them) - i composed the songs and the lyrics too - the second one "à la" Third Ear Band - we were three - i composed the songs - went on playing for a couple of years, and we made some college concerts - then we started to play electric, "à la" Amon Duul or Grateful Dead, it was a sort of raga-rock and we became six - i was still the main composer - after five years i stopped playing oboe in Conservatory and went to University, Musicology - started to study classical composers, from Mahler to modern ones, and minimalism and contemporary classical - started to make electroacoustic experiments with tapes and electronics too - and began to work as a music teacher in the secondary school - this was a very difficult moment - wanted to go further with playing and composing but wasn't able to find the right path - i even joined two renaissance music groups in which i played recorders and sang (...) - a very troubled period - but in 1986, when i i was thirty, the music i'm still playing and composing came to me - 't was a revelation, a mystic moment (some of this moment is in the iki) - 'm still in that mood and i'm 51 - called a friend, she played piano and sang, started to make some arrangements of that music - and then we were four, a sax-flute player and a singer added - we made some concerts in Italy - in 1989 i sent a song to a contest for Radio3 (the classical broadcast in Italy) and won - a musical magazine contacted me for a promotional release - and that was my first issue, it was 1991 and i was 35 - we became six, an harpist replaced the pianist, a percussionist and a bassoon player added - the same magazine promote me to a label and in 1992 i released my first cd for a swiss independent label - this issue gained me some good concerts, i even opened some Michael Nyman ones here in Italy - The Piano... 2/3 thousand peoples.... (brrrr) - in 1994 i founded a musical association, "Musiche Virtuali" - in 1995 the group collapsed (or was I?) and i began to play and to compose as a single, as a free-lance composer - my way of composing became more conceptual (i graduated in Philosophy too) focusing on multimedia projects - since 1995 i released some cd's for a couple of independent italian labels and made concerts - in 2004 formed a new group, called it O.E.S. (Orchestra Eclettica e Sincretista) - it is a very variable organic and now it is becoming an internet ensemble - in 2005 the net label webbed hand records began to release some works of mine - pathmusick, useirecords and dataobscura added.