Versace bathrobe, white sweater and sitting on the sofa. Guè has decided to do things right to present his most beautiful album yet: “Madreperla” with the mega production of Bassi Maestro. The appointment is at the Milan Triennale for a master class – several university students present – on “How to make a good rap record”. A quality start to the year for Italian music with an album full of cross-generational quotes (Ron, Tiromancinor, Ini Kamoze to name a few)many feats from Rkomi, Marracash to Mahmood, impeccable production and with lyrics that tell a lot about Guè’s private life.
One of the most beautiful songs is the single “let me go pt 2″, “Do you understand me or not?” which includes the Italian cover of Ron from the year 1983 from “I can’t do that” signed by Daryl Hall & John Oates, “Free” with Marrakech and Rkomi that speaks the Black Lives Matters movement and body shaming (“The darkness of our time will remain so long / I will learn to see in the dark”) and the intimate “Raus aus der Not”. Mahmoud (“My father left without seeing me fill the forum / No woman filled my heart / Unforgettable night, I will forget everything / The club is full, but I am empty”).
Teacher for a day: “How rap is done well” – Sitting in the Triennale Theater, Guè, with a folder in his hands, announces: “Today I will teach you how to rap well”, and we begin The Sugarhill Gang with “Rapper’s Delight” from 1979, the first rap record in history. During the long rap lesson, Guè also puts the icing on the cake about rap in Italy. “There are people who proclaimed themselves ‘pioneers of rap,’ and that was Adriano Celentano in 1973 with ‘Prisencolinensinainciusol.’ If that were true, Celentano would have pre-empted the Americans. Sci-fi stuff, it’s not really like that. It’s not enough to sing or dance tempo in a rap-based loop, something else is needed. There needs to be a compromise between musicality and lyrics”. So who were the Italian pioneers? Guè has no doubts: “his” Club Dogo.
“I’m a boomer, but not a nostalgic” – The years pass and so do the generations: “I thought I was making an understandable rap, maybe the older generations don’t understand what I’m saying, like it happens to me when I listen to the kids of today and don’t understand anything.” . But does it make sense to talk about boomers? “It’s a bit of a strong word, but yes, I’m a boomer, but not a nostalgic. Today everyone tells me: You have to do TikTok! It’s unbelievable how everything there starts out from a ballet. Incredible to even think that there can be a teenager who starts dancing to a trap song and that song ends up topping the charts and trending. There’s something wrong with this way of listening to music, there’s something dystopian about it. MTV videos killed radio stars. Facebook “killed” the MTV stars, then TikTok came along and killed everyone. In short, there was real carnage (laughs, editor’s note)”.
“WE JUST HAVE TO TELL THE REAL LIFE”
“We just have to tell real life” – The starting point for creating a good album, according to “Professor” Guè, is storytelling: “Telling a story and where we come from. It takes a physical imagery to fictionalize, to draw from raw and real matter. A rule I have set myself is to speak about what I experienced and not report anything from the film or third parties. And he quotes Ice Cube: “A rap is a rap, a rhyme is a rhyme, a riddle is a riddle. But guiding someone through a story masterfully and flawlessly is the most important thing in the game for me.” The analysis then moves on to linguistic freedom of expression (“it is important to talk how you eat”) and an artist’s personality, which is not related to the character is: “If you bet on the character, then we’re all Kanye West. music comes first. I like to quote Geolier People have to like music, not the way they are. I like being a marathon runner, not a sprinter.”
“I HAVE SO MANY FEATS. I ONLY MISS AL BANO!”
“I have accomplished many feats. I just miss Al Bano!” – Then come the balance sheets: “I was lucky enough to experience many things and to get this far. Many make fun of my many tricks, I only miss a duet with Al Bano! But it’s a way to make money and improve in a competitive world. When a new talent wants to shine with me, it means I’ve been able to talk to everyone and be a reference point for this genre. For me, the greatest joy is the feeling of crossing generations.” One thing is certain for the future: “Pop scares me. I like making hits, I don’t aspire to direct the Sanremo Festival or do politics or make films. It just takes courage and I want to be the king of my genre.”