Triangolazioni by Luciano Margorani - Dario D'Alessandro - Chris Cutler

Luciano Margorani, a Milanese guitarist and multi-instrumentalist, is a historic figure in the Avant-Prog and Rock in Opposition (RIO) movements in Italy. He was the driving force behind the group La 1919, active since the early 1980s with a sound that blended industrial, experimental, and avant-garde jazz. His unconventional approach to the instrument often utilizes loops, effects, and home recording techniques to create layered soundscapes.

Dario D'Alessandro, a musician, singer, and visual artist from Palermo, is the leader of the band Homunculus Res, one of the leading modern exponents of the Canterbury sound, with whom he has released several albums that combine psychedelic pop and progressive complexity. His collaboration with Margorani formally began in 2021 with a self-titled album, bringing his melodic sensibility and use of vintage keyboards and glockenspiels to Margorani's rougher textures. He personally designs the artwork for his albums, including Triangolazioni.

Chris Cutler is one of the most influential theorists and percussionists in global experimental music. Founder of the historic  Henry Cow in 1968, he spearheaded the Rock in Opposition movement (1978), which aimed to promote music outside of commercial logic. He runs Recommended Records (RēR Megacorp), a leading label for international avant-garde music. Author of the essay "File Under Popular," he is known for his tireless work as a lecturer and podcast creator (Probes series) on the history of recorded sound. His use of "electrified drums" and free improvisation techniques has led him to collaborate with artists such as Fred Frith, Pere Ubu, and Gong.

Before moving on to the album, here's Luciano Margorani's description of the project, which I've reproduced faithfully:

"This project began in April 2012, when I asked Chris to record six rhythm parts alone, suggesting that he play six different drum parts as if they were finished pieces, following only his inspiration. Shortly after, I gave him some instructions for each piece, such as: track 1 "a march," track 2 "abstract and calm," track 3 "non-rhythmic that slowly becomes rhythmic," track 4 "a song with changes," track 5 "another song with changes," and track 6 "slow and rhythmic."
Chris recorded his parts and sent them back to me already mixed, maintaining control of his sounds. I then asked my bassist friend Luca Pissavini to play and record some improvised electric bass parts over these tracks. Finally, I would add my own improvisations on the electric guitar...

The album's title captures its concept, which is based on several key aspects.

The title directly recalls the figure of a triangle and represents the encounter between three artists from different backgrounds: Margorani, representing "industrial" experimentation and the Italian avant-garde; D'Alessandro, with his melodic and cultured sensibility of psychedelic pop; and Chris Cutler, embodying the history of Rock in Opposition and creative drumming. A triangulation between three artists, three styles, three different sensibilities.

The compositional method was "Inverso," an asynchronous exchange of tracks. The album, in fact, did not originate in a rehearsal room, but through a process that lasted over a decade, as described in the album's presentation. Cutler provided the rhythmic foundation in 2012, recording isolated drum tracks. Margorani and D'Alessandro "triangulated" these rhythms years later, adding lyrics, melodies, and structures, transforming improvised fragments into fully formed songs.

The tendency to overcome the division between cultured music (Avant-Garde) and accessible music (Pop) is evident with the complexity of Cutler's odd time signatures and Margorani's loops coexisting with the melody and irony brought by D'Alessandro's lyrics and keyboards.

While many songs seem to be the product of improvisation, the actual feeling is one of a lack of orderly and conceptual structure, that of a series of "high-level" compositions within which each artist expresses themselves without ever losing the emotions generated, which are coherent within each song.

Although the album and its tracks are titled in Italian, there are no lyrics, but the voice is used as an instrument and the singing is wordless, a syllabic singing (or non-lexical vocables). These sounds have a predominantly melodic function in this case, devoid of linguistic meaning, but thanks to D'Alessandro's interpretative ability, the emphasis shifts as needed, evoking different emotions.

Loops, overlaps, intersections, dissonances, distant, sometimes almost imperceptible sounds, and the noises are constant and wonderful. Cutler's drumming style is capable of handling extremely complex techniques and is crafted with pure taste, a virtuosity that never strays from itself.

We're talking pure contemporary experimental progressive.

The drums are sumptuous. The keyboards are beautiful, along with the glockenspiel, a sort of carillon with a mysterious echo, and the keyboards with long, harmonious sounds. The bass line is extraordinary. The song is simultaneously mysterious, intense, and powerful. The dissonances between the bass and keyboards are beautiful, light. It's also beautiful when the tempo accelerates and the guitar solo takes center stage, with evident dissonances and great execution. An experimental piece, rich in detail and nuance, it demands repeated listening.

Stupidario begins syncopatedly with a positive, airy drum tempo with a jazzy feel, a backbeat on a dissonant guitar solo, and ethereal backing vocals on which the guitar occasionally becomes distorted. The song is peppered with drum chisels, revealing great nuance and richness. The pauses are part of the music, and the guitar and keyboard notes are dissonant. The second half of the song has a hypnotic tempo and a wide selection of sounds, with haunting synth loops and sounds reminiscent of a barrel organ. A decidedly jazzy section, beautifully crafted. The finale returns to a relaxed atmosphere, but the jazz mood remains.

Marcia Trionfale begins as a solemn march with a chaotic juxtaposition of keyboard, guitar, and glockenspiel sounds over a deep, linear bass. Various keyboard lines overlap, with a high-pitched, distorted base over which a deep line moves to mark the tempo. Then begins a spectacular, distorted, high-pitched guitar solo that evokes emotions somewhere between playfulness and tension. It's pure experimentation. The song grows in intensity, as do the emotions it evokes. A slow, haunting march, constantly under control, maintaining the same feeling of suspension with synth interventions and high-pitched, suspenseful intermittent sounds.

"You Don't Have the Cards" (a phrase Trump addressed to Zelensky) is a track characterized by a splendid chaos of percussive sounds, glockenspiel, and slightly distorted keyboards, all in a chaotic and disharmonious intersection. At times, the song has a disturbing funeral march-like musicality, disturbed by a spectacular layering of eclectic and complex percussive sounds. The keyboards range from electronic sounds and intermittent distortions at different speeds to a distorted melodic progression over which the drums build a precise, richly detailed tempo. The atmosphere is suspended and mysterious, with a large, unobtrusive yet very incisive bass line. I love this drumming style, infusing even the simplest textures with complexity. Interrupted and distorted sounds close the song.

"Nubendi Traditi" is the longest track on the album, over 13 minutes long, and is a masterpiece that begins with acoustic guitar, a slow, intense rhythm over long keyboard strums, and a light, suffused drum roll on the hi-hat. The atmosphere is different, more melodic, and the interplay between keyboard and acoustic guitar is spectacular. We're in the most romantic "zone" of Canterbury in the first part of the song, then a hypnotic, continuous and repetitive guitar riff kicks in, interspersed with psychedelic synth sounds. Then the tempo sets in, slow, the synths and guitar accelerate in a loop, then return to acoustic to provide the background for the vocals. A beautiful, relaxed and light atmosphere without drums, just guitars, voices, and a synth base, which remain isolated for a moment before giving way to the guitar alone with an arpeggio, and then the drums return with a rhythmic pattern that is light in touch and pace. When the vocals return, the melody returns, along with the relaxed and positive emotions, but with a sense of melancholy. The song builds towards the finale with echoing guitar strums, without drums and with ethereal keyboard sounds, and the vocals become a rhythmic instrument.

The atmosphere is surreal due to the choice of sounds over the melody. A clean guitar solo then enters, and immediately afterward the tempo accelerates with a hypnotic keyboard riff, and the mood becomes more positive. Great guitar work, first played on high notes, almost pizzicato, then with long, distorted sounds, always over a hypnotic carpet of dissonant keyboards. A long piece that doesn't tire; on the contrary, it intrigues as you wait for its further developments. Sumptuous synth work, with long, continuous sounds forming the basis of a keyboard solo, and then the disturbed, interrupted voice enters. Spectacular.

Terra Santa closes the album with drums drawing virtuosity in the background, a layer of deep, high-pitched, distant sounds like those of the guitar, which arrives with its solo "hidden" among the sounds, while the voice creates an ethereal melody. A slow and melodic distorted keyboard solo enters this layering of disconnected yet harmonious sounds. The atmosphere is simultaneously suspended and intense. Experimentation of great value. Refinement and atmosphere. In brief glimpses, more precise structures emerge, but these are digressions, moments when the non-structure prevails with its chaotic yet atmospherically harmonious sequence of sounds.

A spectacular album, but not for everyone, certainly for fans of experimental music and the Canterbury scene. Excellent, a must-have for any collection. An example of how progressive rock is still in full bloom and evolving.

Note: All links to the musicians' works are in the TAGS under the article title or on the "Artists" page.

Tracklist

1. Sul Farsi (3:16)
2. Bar Eclisse (4:18)
3. Stupidario (4:10)
4. Marcia Trionfale (3:22)
5. You Don't Have the Cards (4:21)
6. Nubendi Traditi (13:37)
7. Terra Santa (5:14)

Duration 38:18

LineUp

- Luciano Margorani - bass, guitars, noises, loops
- Dario D'Alessandro - keyboards, vocals, guitars, glockenspiel, editing, premix
- Chris Cutler - drums, percussion