Riccardo Cocciante - Mu (1972)
Now that the letters of the greek alphabet, such as Mu, are getting a (literally and metaphorically viral) bad wrap, through no fault of their own, it is perhaps time for us to be reminded that letters, syllables, the words they make up, are all just innocent victims of how we choose to name things, and "Mu" - from cows to Cocciante, by way of crypto history loonies - has been for centuries a consistent source of entertainment, one that deserved a better fate in popular memory.
Take for instance this record which, unlike new SARS-CoV-2 variants, is a nice surprise; one I wouldn’t have expected to find while scraping down the
barrels of Italian singer-songwriter prog: that’s like a cocktail mixing
amaretto, limoncello and grappa; what could possibly go wrong? Well, go figure,
not all that much, for once at least (and I do mean once: all the other Riccardo Cocciante records this one misled me to hear were a sappy waste of my time). The
songwriting is rather decent, sometimes even inspired (the adamic Era mattino sul mondo is actually mellotrony-gorgeous; A Dio is beatifically effective; and the genesiac opening and eschatological finale are not at all something I am displeased with), while the arrangements are evocative enough to befit it, keeping things interesting
without overtaking the show or merely pandering to the star’s sense of self-importance.
As naïve as its inspiration warranted, the narrative (put to words by two hired parolieri) goes through a mystical hodge-podge of (at least) biblical and buddhist tropes injected (along with a jarring reference to 'a gram of heroin' (to make everything sound allegorically contemporary and relevant I guess)) in the 'lost continent of Mu'; all of which could very well befit the hermetic machinations of Charles Portis’ Masters of Atlantis. Nonetheless, the constellation of session musicians and arrangers brought into this affair does sound enthusiastic enough about it to make things reasonably compelling, even when they tread on more laughable grounds (e.g. Festa or Vita). Still, if you have the cultural audacity to believe that the subject could still be suitable for more highbrow endeavors (well, sort of highbrow: you would have to hear Mike Patton shriek and 'sing' for this) you should flee towards Eyvind Kang’s Athlantis instead (however fleeting the relation of
the Latin sources he used – Giordano Bruno, primarily - to the work’s title may apparently be).
I was also quite amused for a while by the
verses “Tu, col tuo corpo di fango, non ricordi che in te c’è qualcosa di Mu”. Turns
out it was another of my occasional forays into the wonderful realm of misheard
lyrics, as I imaginatively mistook plain, boring “piú”, for the much more entertaining Mu, what with its bovine overtones and all. It was fun
while it lasted, though, and I look fondly on that time.
In full, for true Gnomons (complete the triangle, scale that cone):
