PIERPAOLO CAPOVILLA :: INTERVIEW

Il Teatro degli Orrori stop off at Estragon, in Bologna, to present the new album Il Nuovo Mondo (of which we already talked about a while ago), and a few hours before the live, while sound check and rehearsals are going on and cigarettes smoke is in the air, DROME meets again Pierpaolo Capovilla, who already gave us a “catastrophic” inspired by that you can enjoy on DROME 20… The organic body of the interview manages to create an introspective view on him, as an artist, a story-teller and a man, especially. Mouthpiece of the everyday life, private and collective horrors, Capovilla talks about Ethics and politics, about Kierkegaard and about the love for his partner, while we initiate our catharsis brought by “The Horrors Theatre”.

DROME: Would you like to speak for everyone else in the band or do you prefer to speak for yourself?
PIERPAOLO CAPOVILLA: I’d rather speak for myself…

D: Fair enough, we’ll direct the questions to you then; how is your approach towards life? Are you happy? Are you angry?
PC: What a question! I am pissed off. All the time. Coming to being is a tragedy, as Carmelo Bene used to say: “Whereas living…Well, living is the most difficult thing ever”, off course I am constantly pissed off!

D: So, how do you react then?
PC: I always try to overstep the challenges life is giving to me.

D: What do you read?
PC: I read a lot, now I am reading a book called In Defence of Lost Causes by Slavoj Zizek, which is a great Marxist and Lacanian Slovenian philosopher, and I am also studying the Russian poetry of the first half of the 20th century.

D: What kind of cultural education have you pursued?
PC: Well, I studied Philosophy, I am not graduated but I have been studying this subject for a long time.

D: Who are you when you are not Il Teatro degli Orrori?
PC: I hope to be a good partner for my girlfriend!

D: What is your position towards Religion and Ethics?
PC: I am a Christian but I do not practice Confession, so I am a Secular, “Kierkegaardian” man. Ethics is the soil of life: the pleasure principle does not rule my ambitions, but Ethics does.

D: What is it that scares you the most?
PC: Death. Death scares me but I am not frightened by it, as I accept it.

D: What do you expect from Il Teatro degli Orrori?
PC: My biggest aim is that Il Teatro Degli Orrori could succeed in being an honest and authentic rock band, managing to be inserted in the rock tradition among the great others. We come from the Hard-core music, and we are trying to combine together the hard-core genre with the beauty of the Italian instrumental and vocal music, especially with the song-writing Italian tradition. If we succeed in that, we’ll be more than happy.

D: Do you feel motivated by a social or political interest in writing your songs?
PC: Everything is politics. If I get back drunk at home at night and I beat my wife up, I am doing politics. If I buy organic food or a McDonald hamburger, I am doing politics. If I read a Faletti’s book instead of reading Kierkegaard, I am doing politics. If I am composing a song in a certain way rather than another, I am doing politics. If my name is Laura Pausini, I am doing politics, If I am Pierpaolo Capovilla, I am still doing politics… The difference between me and Laura is that our politics is the complete opposite one!

D: How did you – and do you – cope with this Italian Political season which lasted more than 20 years now?
PC: It makes me feel sick. Before, I did feel really disgusted… Having the worse representative of the worse bourgeois Italian class as a prime minister It was a source of anxiety, obviously. Now, the Italian government seems to be run by people, apparently, better qualified… But unfortunately we are always forced to deal with politicians pursuing a Weltanschauung, a way of seeing the world only directed by Capitalistic aims and perspectives. I am against the capitalism, I sustain other ways of developing, I still don’t know which, but definitely not capitalism!

D: What do you think about young generations being forced to go abroad to pursue a career, especially an artistic one?
PC: To be honest, we live in a country where the process of social and cultural involution as well as a economic recession has been going on for the last 20 years. 20 years of “Berlusconism” are responsible of some of the biggest social damages in the history of the Italian Republic. Now, it is time to rebuilt the country, so I prefer staying here and give my little contribute to help the reconstruction of it. I don’t do it for patriotism as I don’t give a damn about my country! – (Laugh, EN) – I am a citizen of the world, I love the world, I think our country is only a piece of land settled in a certain longitude, we are nothing else than a subset… However, I am still really fond of Italy! Especially of Venice, which is where I live.

D: Is there any advice you would like to give to emerging musicians?
PC: They should all go to Venice and set up a band! Why not?!

D: Who are you talking about in your songs?
PC: Well, in the new album, we are mainly talking about immigrants; the songs are inspired by true stories but they are also made up, invented, especially one song called Adrien which talks about a killer… Talking about immigrants is interesting, as their life tend to be more interesting than the life of the “sedentary”, those people who tend to stay in the same place. Nowadays, choosing to emigrate, moving to the other side of the world to work and sustain your own family abroad is a courageous action, people constantly risk their life… so, I think that people living as outcasts usually are those plenty of stories to tell.

D: So, how did you decide to switch from the previous album to this new one?
PC: We are a band still seeking for our “music style”. What does matter for us, is being able to not repeat ourselves, trying to avoid to do the same things all over again; we are aimed to look around and tell what we are going through, talking about our life, our future and past as well.

D: One last curiosity… how did the song È Colpa Mia came out?
PC: The song came out reflecting on my own generation. It is a song revealing something about me as well. I was born in 1968 and I do believe that my generation hasn’t been careful or vigilant enough, and that the country got ruined specifically because of this lack of attention. We decided not to be involved, we chose to be careless, getting wrapped up in our everyday life selfishness and we didn’t realise how our country was getting into something horrible… The song is also an act of “contrition” of my own persona, as an awful representative of my generation.

Giulia Frigieri
26.04.2012