CORTE DEI MIRACOLI

If the city of Genoa was (one of) the Chistopher Columbus origin, it certainly missed the rush of early 70's first wave prog bands, but it certainly didn't miss the second batch/wave, with Picchio Dal Pozzo, Celeste (two of my faves) and the over-rated Corte De Miracoli Presenting a dual keyboard attack and no guitar (except on the opening track), CDM is a fairly unbalanced quintet, but this was rather more common in the second part of the 70's. Nevertheless this plays a negative role in the band's sound reinforced with the singer's lack of depth and limited capacities (and I don't like much his voice either ;o))).. Coming with a cosmic fantasy gatefold artwork, the album was released in 76

Starting on an almost-Zeuhlian piece Verra L'Uomo (due in part to the electric piano, but alsothe bass and the rare guitar), but by the time the vocals enter the track, it's all but a distant memory, although the music does return to the genre outside of the sung passages. Actually , it seems rather clear that the singer couldn't cope with the track's mainline so they had to adapt it clumsily.The following Verso Il Sole doesn't suffer this schizophrenic personality and presents an excellent piano and percussion exchange in its middle section, but the track returns to the opening motif. Storia Fiabesca hovers around the same musical realm as what we've just been exposed so far (the Zeuhlian passages not included here).

The flipside opens on the Rituale Notturno, but again the nature of the synth's sounds and the singer's voice are slowly grating my patience away and the grotesque succession of keyboards passages and their collage in the track's middle section is really weak, if not laughable on the Spinal tap genre. Needless to say that the slow passage just after is a complete cliché as well and it finishes in a completely ridiculous manner. Good riddance and arrivaderci!! The closing "epic" is a better level, even if you'll find grosso modo the same flaws than on the rest of the album. Not that much more credible and by the time the track comes to its hilarious and tacky breakdown, we're really glad the album's over. No doubt we'll be waiting another millennium before giving this album another shot.

CDM was clearly a second wave and second class traveller, one that would've never been groundbreaking and a mediocre genre-consolidator. As a matter of fact and despite some good passages, I'd be tempted to cite CDM's sole historical album as the exact type of band that actually helped the punks and the dub music press drive a nail into prog's coffin, but the nails belonged to CDM and just happened to sit by the coffin along with an abandoned hammer next to it.