According to the Italian label Futuribile, this is one of the rarest and most sought-after records Naples has ever produced. From the outside, this is just as difficult to check as it is to understand the lyrics on »Sta Guagliona Mo Ddà« unless you happen to know the dialect spoken in the city. It is at least clear that the title is about a »girl« (guagliona). But understanding is not so important. If you let yourself go with the flow, you can just sit back and breathe in the vernacular rap from 1983. The accompanying music is thick-bass Italo-disco-style funk with slightly reverberating drums and synthesisers. To round off the first official vinyl edition of this Tonino Balsamo work – back then probably only cassettes and a few promo copies were going around – this fine piece of music is also being re-released as an instrumental, which is also banging. Plus there is another, previously unreleased version from the 90s, arranged by Vincenzo Anolodo, the keyboard player who worked on the original back then. But the original is stronger, if only due to the wonderfully brash voice. Whether Tonino Balsamo is a namesake of the famous composer and saxophonist Antonio Balsamo or actually the same person must be left open at this point. In any case, the latter produced the piece. And it has a pretty gnarly saxophone solo at the end.
Dandolo
Ticket To Ride
Mirella