From the top step of the podium two weeks ago after its release, the new album has just dropped to the third step. But “Dedicated to us” is already on the launch pad in the Verona Arena with its mega tour in the sports halls, where it will live up to its title from tomorrow. After making a hundred thousand fans “scream to heaven” at the two concerts at the San Siro and the Olimpico in Milan and Rome in July, Ligabue returns to his beloved live music with the new tour in which he will be in osmotic contact until then. Scenes back December 1st (in Messina) with his audience, the “We” evoked by the new inspired album released on September 22nd. In addition to his thirty-year successes, he will perform all the new eleven unreleased songs live, accompanied by his faithful “group”, which will travel from the two dates at La Scala to the following dates in Turin and from there throughout the country in the mid-north to (to Rome on November 18th and 19th) Eboli, Bari, Reggio Calabria and the other end of the strait. “The concert is a bit the center of everything for me,” he explains. There is nothing like this experience because it’s not so much about what I do, but about what I experience. And it’s one of the things that, over time, has forced me, among other things, to use the teleprompter on stage, because I concentrate on people’s faces and risk losing the thread of the text. I am fascinated by the kind of emotions that the people in front of me experience, by participation and sometimes even transfiguration. The way everyone interprets the songs in their own way is priceless. For this reason, since 1987, when I gave my first concert, I have not been able to stay long without going on tour.
What does the meeting with the public represent in detail?
For me, the concert is the ultimate exercise of privilege. For some time now I have been able to count on excellent musicians, exceptional technicians and of course an audience that celebrates me. I’m the guest of honor at a party where my only job is to put on a good performance. But performance anxiety is a type of anxiety that doesn’t bother me too much, even though I think everything is now perpetuated from moment to moment by cell phones and cameras. But it’s all really a privilege that I’m enjoying more and more to the fullest.
His son Lenny played on every song on the new album, but will not be on stage. Why?
He won’t be playing on tour because there is an already well-oiled music machine that also just played at the San Siro and the Olimpico. But I trust that the day will come when he will be on stage with me too. He has a natural talent for rhythm, he already knows very well the dynamics of the drums, which is a very difficult instrument. Eventually, Lenny was recruited by the notoriously picky producer because he believed Lenny was the right drummer for this album.
What was it like working in the recording studio with your son?
On the one hand, I had this professional experience with my son and found a “different” way of communication, because with music you communicate without words. On the other hand, having our own recording studio meant we took the time we needed to discuss each song a lot with the collaborators, and I don’t think Lenny has ever had as much information about me as he did on this occasion. It was a great experience, a special dialogue. An excess of belonging.
The basic theme of the album is…
Yes, the need for belonging is also evoked by the album’s title, Dedicato a noi. It’s not that I have a clear idea of this “we”, but I feel the need to call us to the rescue. We recognize ourselves in a set of values and beliefs, but also in doubts. Always bearing in mind that every person is unique, it is important to come together again in this phase of global social and humanitarian emergency to focus on some priorities.
A dramatic snapshot of our times that led her to write the song “Who knows if God feels alone?”
The piece began as a list of fears. We are witnessing a terrible start to a decade between the pandemic, the war in Ukraine, the catastrophic effects of global warming, migration, ever-increasing social unrest and femicide. All this leads to an increase in fears, which are often the opposite of each other. That is, the fear of being like others, but also of not being like others. The fear that God doesn’t exist and the fear that he does.
And what do you think creates this cascade?
The first result is that fear makes us even lonelier. As I thought about humanizing God, I suddenly had doubts: Who knows whether God feels alone? The focus of the song is that God feels a little let down by us. When I look at the iconography of a God watching us, he is certainly not witnessing some grand show. In my life and also in songs, I have often tried to humanize the figure of God, to get a little closer to him. It is a spiritual need of mine.
As a believer?
I can’t help but feel like a believer, and I have also been a practicing Catholic. I certainly have a deep spiritual need within me and never imagined that life was just here. If anything, I’ve sometimes had trouble identifying with our religion, which I feel puts pain too much at the center of its self-expression. As a child, I suffered greatly from these depictions. Instead, I felt the need to place more emphasis on the joy of life. And it worried me that the symbol of Christianity is a crucified 33-year-old boy. But I remain Catholic and accepted the Pope’s invitation to meet the artists in the Sistine Chapel last June 23rd.
What experience was it?
Great emotion when I shook the Pope’s hand, because I have the feeling that Francis also embodies certain social values in which I recognize myself in a special way. But beyond that I have an intense memory of his beautiful speech, which I keep, and of the last picture of Michela Murgia, who was very Catholic. After shaking the Pope’s hand and crossing me before my turn, she looked at me with moving eyes and placed her hand on her heart, as if to let me know how important this moment was for her, who knew that her life was coming to an end (she died on August 10th last year, editor’s note).
Where do certain values for Ligabue come from?
About my roots and the fact that I have learned to give thanks. I am grateful for many things in my life and also for the fact that I have managed to tell and confess my happiness over the last few years. This also means that they were born in the 1960s and raised by parents who, even if they had not yet completed primary school, were able to pass on cultural and, in their own way, spiritual values. One of my many, never-ending spiritual controversies is the fact that in the song “You Know Heaven,” I portrayed my father, a convinced atheist, and even made him the bearer of my message upwards. This also shows the feelings I have towards my father.
And towards his artistic “father” like Elvis? I will see the presentation of Priscilla in Venice?
I’m going to watch Sofia Coppola’s film because I’m interested in the female perspective of someone who lived in the shadow of one of the greatest icons of the 20th century. But there is a lot to consider. Elvis Presley was the sad example of how too much drove him into a state of extreme loneliness. A huge gap that we must continue to fill until we die. A collapse due to hypertrophy. His case must be a warning. Today, when success is also a social and media myth, we need to think about what its true meaning is. There are many who fall victim to it. So it’s not true at all that happiness can lie in success. That too in a shared profession. At the expense of true values.