BLAK SAGAAN
territory ︎︎︎ EU / UK | agent: federico@hangarbooking.com
In an age that demands hyper acceleration, kinetic flashes and byte voracity, Blak Saagan sticks out like a sore thumb with a sprawling body of work that requires attention and unlocks profound symbols
and meaning with every passage. After a 5 year gap, the Venetian composer returns with his most personal and openly political statement yet,
‘Un Sequestro Lungo 10.000 Anni’, a staggering 108 minute triple album soundtracking a dystopian city through flashes of futuristic fourth world visions, warehouse 80s rave-ups, meditative trance and dark rumblings.
Following his acclaimed ‘Se Ci Fosse La Luce Sarebbe Bellissimo’ was never going to be an easy feat but Samuele Gottardello (Blak Saagan) approached the fresh canvas with a renewed sense of
commitment sparking a dense parallel world inhabited by paranoia, control and repression. A world that is relieved by the figure of a woman with the body of a bird emerging from the asphalt and freeing
humanity from the “sequestro” (kidnapping) to which it has long been subjected. Dystopia pushed to the limits and sadly close to our current affairs.
Stemming from a collaboration with Iranian illustrator Majid Bita, ‘Un Sequestro Lungo 10.000 Anni’ narrates a city populated with imaginary creatures bustling to the rhythms of Iranian punk, rebels with mullets sweating through Middle Eastern hallucinatory disco beats, propaganda VHS tapes and Saagan’s usual atmospheric celestiality built on library music, kosmische architectures and industrial serenity.
Referencing the ecosystem that Marija Gimbutas and Philip K. Dick handed down to us, Blak Saagan’s music threads the needle hypnotically moving from Carpenter synth worship, the anxiogenic
cyber-pulsating ‘The Blak Fire’ or the persian EDM of ‘Idoli Rotti fatti di Paura ed Oro’, to metaphysical experimentations that recall the work of legendary Italian sound architects Egisto
Macchi and Nora Orlandi, the bouncing astral esoteric ‘La Dama con il Corpo di Uccello’ and the spiritual cadence of ‘Mila nel bosco’. The authoritarian climax of the album is fully delivered on tracks
like ‘Il Giorno di Zaha'kol’ and ‘Daēvā - Falso Dio’ where pounding severity reaches the textural punishment of heavy-hitters like Godflesh and Ramleh, industrial malaise for the masses.
‘Un Sequestro Lungo 10.000 Anni’ is also the first Blak Saagan album to feature vocal contributions, heightening the cinematic experience and carrying it spiritually. Ambient-folk goddess
Julinko brings an elysian quality to ‘Il Giorno di Zaha'kol’, the submerged vocals of techno produce Annalisa Iembo (Jerome) are printed on the drugged out coldwave hit ‘Benzocrazia’, Italian illustrator Liz Van Der Nüll posse-raps on the synth-punk siren blaring ‘FRREPa’ while cosmic loner James Jonathan Clancy ethereally closes ‘Idoli Rotti fatti di Paura ed Oro’.
‘Un Sequestro Lungo 10.000 Anni’ plays like a puzzle where every piece eerily discloses a historical
metaphor, a captivating voyage where Blak Saagan’s time machine crosses 10,000 years of patriarchy, monotheism, colonialism and capitalism, denouncing a cruel present, while remembering a
gloomy past. Some might call it conscious escapism or spiritual socialism, some might see it a evoking a new realm, a path trailblazed by outsiders like David Sylvian, Muslimgauze and Chrome... painting a black horizon from which, perhaps, hope can still emerge.
︎︎︎
FB / IG / SPOTIFY
BONO / BURATTINI
territory ︎︎︎ EU / UK | agent: jacopo@hangarbooking.com
At Land, Ritual in Transfigured Time and A study in Choreography for Camera), Francesca Bono (vocalist, performer, founder of Ofeliadorme and member of the Donnacirco collective) and Vittoria Burattini (percussionist, multi-faceted drummer and member of influential Italian avant-rock band Massimo Volume) created a dense hypnotic transfixing collection of songs based upon the sole use of the Juno 60 synthesizer and the organic linear pulsating sound of a drum kit.
These apparent limitations set the scene for an incredibly rich and rewarding voyage that immediately establishes a strong identity that oscillates between circular dream soundscapes and psychedelic rhythmic architectures. Bono / Burattini excels in threading magical images where objects transform without warning (Your House Is A Ghost) and collapse into kosmische grooves (La Trama Del Desiderio) or when humming electronics mold into temporal dimensions (Sogno Nel Vigneto). Burattini’s astonishing use of the drum kit and her mallet driven timbre produce space and tension (Dinner Illusion) perfectly complementing Bono’s synthesized realm made of nuance and reflection (Dancing Demons). One of the album’s key elements is the sparse use of Bono’s singing, an intricate mix of measured phrasing, breathing, spiral structures and extrasensorial-like choirs that seem to reference the rich Italian tradition of cosmic jazz, library music and the unmatched work of the RAI engineers in the 70s working with Gruppo Di Improvvisazione Nuova Consonanza, Morricone, Daniela Casa. The driving Can-like pulse of Le Ossa shows force and flow while Stella’s haunting piano recreates a futuristic horror-movie OST.
‘Suono In Un Tempo Trasfigurato’ is beautifully recorded and mixed by Italian composer Stefano Pilia, a perfect match for Bono / Burattini’s sonic explorations and for a record that intersects experimental wave, alien grooves, contemporary electronics and futuristic sci-fi. Their blend of analog electronics and organic pulses place them in a time out of joint where dancing remains the one constant ritual.
These apparent limitations set the scene for an incredibly rich and rewarding voyage that immediately establishes a strong identity that oscillates between circular dream soundscapes and psychedelic rhythmic architectures. Bono / Burattini excels in threading magical images where objects transform without warning (Your House Is A Ghost) and collapse into kosmische grooves (La Trama Del Desiderio) or when humming electronics mold into temporal dimensions (Sogno Nel Vigneto). Burattini’s astonishing use of the drum kit and her mallet driven timbre produce space and tension (Dinner Illusion) perfectly complementing Bono’s synthesized realm made of nuance and reflection (Dancing Demons). One of the album’s key elements is the sparse use of Bono’s singing, an intricate mix of measured phrasing, breathing, spiral structures and extrasensorial-like choirs that seem to reference the rich Italian tradition of cosmic jazz, library music and the unmatched work of the RAI engineers in the 70s working with Gruppo Di Improvvisazione Nuova Consonanza, Morricone, Daniela Casa. The driving Can-like pulse of Le Ossa shows force and flow while Stella’s haunting piano recreates a futuristic horror-movie OST.
‘Suono In Un Tempo Trasfigurato’ is beautifully recorded and mixed by Italian composer Stefano Pilia, a perfect match for Bono / Burattini’s sonic explorations and for a record that intersects experimental wave, alien grooves, contemporary electronics and futuristic sci-fi. Their blend of analog electronics and organic pulses place them in a time out of joint where dancing remains the one constant ritual.
︎︎︎
IG / FB / SPOTIFY