The Zen Circus: the society of the show is 'Evil'

La copertina de «Il Male», nuovo album di The Zen Circus

Evil is definitely an album in which Zen Circus' old rock soul prevails over their songwriting soul. On a stylistic level, what kind of reasoning is behind it?
Andrea: "The only thing we said to each other before working on it was: why don't we make a record the old-fashioned way, sit in the rehearsal room for two years and then record? And so we did. A practice that should be the norm, then years happen when you make more produced records.... This time we felt it was right for everything to be as simplified as possible: the three of us in the recording studio I have here at home, in Livorno, and that's it. A played record, without intoning anything'.

Karim: 'If you like, it was a bit of a reaction to our immediately previous albums. The way of making music has changed over the years, and even our last few works started from something different from the concept of three people locked in a small room, as it used to be. A concept that in Male we wanted to recover.

Ufo: 'Because we are a band. We wanted to make it more obvious. And so our live soul came out'.

You say Il Male and you think of the legendary alternative magazine founded in 1978 by Pino Zac and Vincino. You open the vinyl and find there an illustration by Enzo Sferra, who was an author. What did that adventurous season in the history of Italian publishing represent for you?
Andrea: "On an anagraphic level we are a bit younger than the protagonists of that era, but we breathed that air there: we grew up at the Macchia Nera social centre, I remember the Stampa Alternativa Mille Lire books when I entered the homes of those older than me..."

Ufo: 'I learned to read with Linus. I remember Frigidaire, Cuore, Comix... very well. It went that ex post, after the record was finished, we asked ourselves: what do we Zen Circus do? Politics? Culture? Counter-culture? Satire? Do we make people laugh? Do we piss people off? Then let us take as a point of reference someone who did all these things at once. And did them very well: Evil, meaning the magazine, that was.

Karim: 'Al Male were the first in the history of Italian publishing to bring together the sacred and the profane, with a certain taste for paradox. Just as, in their own small way, Zen try to do'.

In It's only a moment the theme of existential balance returns. And a concept that is dear to you returns: 'You are your mother, you are your father: there is no escape'. Almost as if there were a destiny, above our heads, from which we cannot free ourselves. "It is only a moment". But exactly how long does this moment last?
Andrea: 'That is a song dedicated to those who at least once in their lives have had to say to themselves "It's only a moment". Like all our things, it sounds defeatist, but it is also a warning to be able to embrace ourselves, realise what is happening to us and react. It is not necessarily the existential assessment of a 47-year-old person, but an invitation to take care of oneself'.

Karim: 'On It's only a moment I can say that rarely has one of our pieces had such a strong empathetic reaction from the audience. It must be that we had been stationary for a few years'.

Ufo: 'Or it will be that those who listen to us have said that thing to themselves.

"I dreamt this song, like McCartney Yesterday," reads the lyrics of Better Than Nothing. Did it really happen like that?
Andrea: 'I confirm. And precisely I dreamt that we were playing it in a TV studio. Then my cat woke me up, I was falling out of bed but I managed in time to grab the guitar and throw it down. The funny thing was that we were playing it for the first time right in a TV studio. I had dreamt of music several times but, before this one, I had never been able to stare at it. Then, being a Zen piece, we put some self-mockery into it: compared to Yesterday "of course it's not the same thing but the subconscious doesn't lie, it's no fun knowing that everything is gone forever".

You basically dreamt up a song about the need to come to terms with one's dreams...
Andrea: 'Actually yes... very interesting perspective.

Novecento and Vecchie troie instead express the point of view of Generation X, your generation. Does pride or shame prevail?  
Andrea: "Well... I would say shame (laughs, ed.). In the two songs, the generational connotation is both there and not there. We have a diverse audience, in many cases younger. We ourselves are an intergenerational group: between Ufo and Karim, ten years pass between us. There is a bit of us in the pieces, but it's not just us.

Ufo: 'The two songs carry a claim that is full of frustration. An unpleasant idea that people of my generation have is for example to see the 20th century return'.

Karim: 'Consider that ours was the first generation that codified and turned nostalgia into a business. You can see this overbearingly in the videos of TikTok, the social network that has been moving the most money lately. And it is feeding precisely on nostalgia. The paradox lies in the fact that we Generation X are now nostalgic for a time when, in the end, we weren't even well off.

The Zen Circus: da sinistra Ufo, Andrea Appino e Karim Qqru (photo by Ilaria Magliocchetti Lombi)

And then there is Viral: 'At the parade the celebrities/ celebrate exclusivity together/ but the explosive is much more inclusive/ and will make them shine in the sky'. Is this more a condemnation of the society of show business or of society in general?
Andrea: "It's nice that you pick up on the reference to Guy Debord who was a staple in the writing of this song.

Karim: 'But Debord killed himself'.

Andrea: 'And I don't, tié. It is clear that in our pieces we are not always the ones to speak. As in De André's Bombarolo, another reference in the song, we sometimes feel the need to make this Evil speak. Which can be envious, resentful and animated by deep hatred towards a certain kind of post-truth'.

Karim: 'Really strange, when you think about it, the story of Viral. It wasn't even supposed to be on the record, yet it ended up being the track that represents the record the most, perhaps because it better represents what we are going through'.

Ufo: 'Because it is a song that subtends a revolt'.

What kind of revolt?
Andrea: 'We don't know and we don't say, but we are part of it too.

The judgement on contemporary entertainment society here in Italy, what is it anyway?
Karim: 'Merciless'.

UFO: 'Everything is format'.

Andrea: 'An artist should do things as long as he has something to say. Beyond that there is only the right to oblivion. Not everyone in our world is at peace with the idea. And that is a problem'.