Encounter Sugar it’s like asking questions to the Horse’s Mouth. Without filters, sincere, direct. TO FqMagazine the artist presented his first cover project, “Discover“, With 13 historical pieces of world and Italian music stripped and revisited in a Zucchero key. The artist also lent his voice to Clay Calloway, character from the animated film “Sing – Getting strongerWhich will be released in theaters on December 23rd. In the original Clay Calloway film version is voiced by friend Bono of U2, also present in the duet “Sing life“In” Discover “. The return to live is scheduled at the Verona Arena with 14 shows scheduled for April and May 2022. “I had to reschedule all the concerts in Italy and around the world – explains Zucchero – and it wasn’t easy at all. We need to end this story and the only way is to get vaccinated. I and my collaborators did it. In our sector there have also been many problems for workers. The truth is that the Institutions of culture and popular music don’t give a shit. It’s obvious”.
In the album many collaborations, in addition to the aforementioned Bono also “Luce (Tramonti a nord est)” with Elisa (“It presented itself to me like this: ‘I’m Elisa but I don’t go to Sanremo anyway‘. I told her to go for a ride to the sea and in the meantime I wrote the incision “),” Natural blues “with Mahmood (“A real talent, he has a soulful tone. In the studio I had proof that he is”) and “I saw Nina fly” with Fabrizio De André (“Our musical worlds were quite distant but in this piece I found myself in rhythm and sensuality”). There is also a hand of Michael Stipe dei REM. With “Amore ora (No Time for Love Like Now)” (“He wrote me that he was moved when he heard my version of the piece in the deserted Piazza San Marco in Venice”). There is also room for i Maneskin: “They are good, they have filled a void with their transgressive and irreverent rock, with a very strong image, against the politically correct. I wanted to record ‘Honky Tonk Women’ by the Rolling Stones with them but they were out and about and didn’t have time, I’d like to write for them ”.
You started from 500 songs to choose 11 to put on the disc. What was the selection criterion?
I started three years ago and from time to time I went back to the covers that I wanted to do. I thought about the first bands where I played and the songs we played dai Genesis ai Pink Floyd up to the progressive world and al Rhythm and Blues alla Wilson Pickett. I remembered the songs that I liked a lot back then up to our times. It’s been so many years and so many beautiful songs that I wanted to write myself and then it’s obvious that one begins to say ‘there are songs that it is better not to touch so as not to ruin them‘then there’s the one you like but you try it but it’s not good for your vocal cords… So I got to a hundred songs.
Until the final squeeze …
Exactly. Then I took into account my two souls: the Afro-American one with whom I grew up and from which I still draw today for my music and then the Italian melody, which represents my origins.
The collaboration with Bono of U2 is also renewed in the duet “Canta la vita (Let Your Love Be Known)”. What person is he?
Bono is Irish, to begin with, so he is very close to us Italians in temperament. It’s hot, he likes to party and being together with friends, a driving force and a person of great soul. Above all it is no frills, it is not politically correct. If he says yes it is yes, if he says no it is no. We have also done many things together and long journeys. There is chemistry between us and it is also very sensitive, intelligent and humble because if he writes me a text he asks me if he likes it, if he can change it… Small details that denote his great availability. In short (laughs, ed).
The songs on the album have optimism as their common denominator. Is it a case in a complex period like the one we are experiencing?
There are no very rhythmic, aggressive songs like I may have done in the past. ‘Discover’ is a softer album even the arrangements which are minimalist. It’s a winter drive, to listen to at home with a glass of wine, even two, and enjoy it like that.
How do you hug music?
Yes, I feel this need, that of embracing. In these passages there is melancholy but not depression and there is also a bit of hope. I hope that listening to this record you don’t think and try to see the light. We are waiting for everything to end but with Covid every six months you never know what happens and the light gets dimmer. There is also hope in ‘Discover’.
In short, will music save us?
Music, tenderness, friendship, respect and much, much more.