Jovanotti

Every now and then Jovanotti comes back, even if the best part of his career seems like ancient history by now. The years of rowdy, ramshackle hip-hop brought him great success in the mid-'90s, then came the world music infatuations of the 2000s, and the funk-electro-pop whirlwind of the years that followed. Jovanotti has released a massive amount of music—studio albums, live records, compilations—and often his albums have brought together very different musical worlds. The compilation “Backup - Lorenzo 1987-2012” (2012) is a good starting point for those who don’t want to get lost in his vast output, which hasn't always been backed by effective choices. Be that as it may, regardless of what I personally think, Jovanotti is a superstar in Italian music and has gone from being a “lucky guy” to becoming an intergenerational figure who brings together wildly different audiences, often gathered at colorful concert-events. People have a lot of affection for Jovanotti, even though he’s been artistically tired for quite a while—so much so that after “Il disco del Sole” (2022), he decided to take a break. A serious bike accident in Santo Domingo—ironically fitting with the public image he’s built over the years—led him to reflect on the body and return with his sixteenth (!) studio album.

“Il corpo umano vol. 1” is a naïve album, as its author often is, mixing singer-songwriter touches—carried by an uncertain vocal delivery—with modern productions by Dardust, Michele Canova, and Federico Nardelli. The lyrics still often flirt with shallow wisdom, but that’s his way of doing poetry: half banality, half insight. One might say, tweaking a tired formula, that many songs make you dance but also reflect—like “Montecristo”, a philosophical reggaeton, or “Fuorionda”, a politicized funk track. It gets worse when he slips into the pathetic, like in the piano ballad “Un mondo a parte”, the tearful diary-style “L’aeroplano”, the childish rhyme of “Senza se e senza ma”, the chamber-pop reflections of “Grande da far paura”, or the bland pop-rock of “Innamorati e liberi” and “101”. It’s better not to listen too closely to the lyrics—instead, the songs shine where production takes the lead, like in “Universo”, a folk-infused electronic orgy thanks to Dardust, or the closing track “Il corpo umano”, which evolves from a sirtaki into an EDM party that couldn’t be more Jovanotti.

Running at low speed, Jovanotti reveals a more singer-songwriter side, and even if we overlook the quite limited vocal performance, he too often falls into banality, self-indulgence, and sentimentality. The accident, and also his advancing age, now force him to tone down his contagious (if sometimes cloying) enthusiasm, relying mainly on the producers. The result is a first volume of fifteen tracks, none of which seem likely to join his best songbook, and which will mostly serve as a pretext for new, torrential live performances.

17/04/2025