Industrie Discografiche Lacerba

Industrie Discografiche Lacerba is an Italian independent record label founded in Florence, Italy in 1982 by Paolo Cesaretti. Named after the futurist literary journal Lacerba (circulating in Florence between 1913 and 1915), the label produced a magazine called FREE where each issue contained a 7-inch single split between two bands or more. Eventually, the magazine idea was dropped in favor of conventional record releases featuring musical acts from Florence, such as Pankow, Federico Fiumani, Minox, Rinf Rinf, as well as Steven Brown.

History[edit]

FREE
The first Lacerba release was a split 7-inch record featuring one band on each side, enclosed in a magazine called FREE which spawned three more issues. FREE circulated as a Xeroxed fanzine for a couple years before being reloaded as a printed booklet with a vinyl record housed in a sealed package. The short essays comprised in the four issues of FREE covered diverse topics such as appreciation pieces on Frank Sinatra, Fortunato Depero, Yoko Ono, Tove Jansson, Catherine Deneuve, Einstürzende Neubauten (more); interviews with Chris and Cosey, SPK, Virgin Prunes, (more). The four published records feature the following artists: Diaframma, Pankow, Schleimer K, Neon, Portion Control, Die Form, Rinf, Fra Lippo Lippi, Minox.

Federico Fiumani's Neogrigio
As his band Diaframma was just becoming a supernova in the Italian music scene (the 1984 album Siberia is ranked by Rolling Stone Magazine among the 10 best Italian albums of all time) Federico Fiumani started his own solo path with this hand-drawn book of poems. Asked about it in an interview, Fiumani says: "Neogrigio is a term I invented to describe a dark, gloomy feeling. I'm thinking of Sartre and the existentialism that infuses the novels La Noia as well as Gli Indifferenti by my favorite writer Alberto Moravia. Siberia and the poetry collection came out around the same time, and one could say that the poems are notes for never-finished songs, or the opposite: there were not enough tracks to put the poems to music."

Minox
An earlier contribution to FREE from Florentine band Minox led to the recording of several more tracks. Because of a shared aesthetic territory with Tuxedomoon, which the band admired, Steven Brown was recruited to produce the album Lazare, and Gilles Martin mixed it in Brussels. Concerned with melody, synth textures, moody cinematic and theatrical ambience (Minox also composed for the theater), and an avant-garde tendency to mix genres, Lazare is difficult to categorize. It was released on CD in 2008 with three extra tracks. Minox recorded a sophomore album, tentatively called MondoMinox, produced by Gilles Martin, which used musicians like Blaine L. Reininger and Luc Van Lieshout, but after a distribution deal fell through, and Lacerba slowed down operations, the album was shelved. Minox started their own Lacerba-adjacent label Suite Inc., and released several more records including collaborations with artists like Lydia Lunch and Krisma. Two of the lost songs from MondoMinox (Limboland and Marching) were included in the 2014 collection At the End of Modernity?. The final line-up of Minox comprises Mirco Magnani, Marco Monfardini and Daniele Biagini.

Steven Brown's Luigi Tenco Project
After spending time in Tuscany to record Lazare, Steven Brown grew smitten with Italian music, especially 1960s pop and singer/songwriter Luigi Tenco, whose notorious suicide turned him into a mythical figure. The idea of doing an album of Tenco covers took shape and used some members of Minox as personnel in the studio. The resulting mini-album Brown Plays Tenco features five versions of the most popular Luigi Tenco songs. A version called Brown Plays Tenco, Studio & Live was released on CD in 2007 with ten extra tracks, recorded during the BPT tour in 1988.

Rinf and Adrian Sherwood
Impressed with the style of the record label On-U Sound, Lacerba reached out to its owner, legendary producer Adrian Sherwood, with the offer to produce a young punk/funk outfit from Florence, called Rinf. Sherwood accepted the invite and travelled to Italy to record with the band. The recording sessions proved chaotic and were resumed in London a few months later; the resulting cuts were released on two separate EPs in 1987 while plans for an album were abandoned, as the band dissolved. The seven tracks from both EPs were collected in 2016 on a vinyl release titled Der Westen Ist Am Enden.

Cancelled releases and Hiatus
After the release of the Sherwood collaborations, the label went virtually dormant. Further planned releases –like a collaboration between Italian band Rosemary's Baby and Thee Temple Ov Psychick Youth AKA Psychic TV– were cancelled. The EP Wyndham Lewis by Ultramarine was eventually released by Belgian label Les Disques du Crepuscule. A 30-year "coma" was punctuated by expanded reprints of previously published records, and the collection of unreleased tracks At the End of Modernity?.

La Bellezza Riunita (the Lucio Battisti project)
LB/R La Bellezza Riunita, the first batch of original contributions to the label in 30 years, sees the light in March 2018. LB/R is described as "an investigation of the songs" written by Italian legend Lucio Battisti with lyricist Pasquale Panella and contains 13 cover versions of tracks from the last five Lucio Battisti albums, the so-called "dischi bianchi." It features contributions from artists as diverse as Daniele Biagini, Cristalli Liquidi, Pankow, Riva, Rachele Bastreghi (of Baustelle), Ernesto Tomasini, Man Parrish, Spartiti (Jukka Reverberi of Giardini di Mirò and Max Collini of Offlaga Disco Pax), DJ Rocca, Larsen, Federico Fiumani, Little Annie, Backwords, The Love and Trust Collective, Alexander Robotnick and Bottin. All the tracks were recorded in 2017 specifically for the LB/R project and the album was nominated as a finalist for the prestigious Targa Tenco award.

Catalog / Discography[edit]

Artist(s)	Title(s)	Format	Year	Catalog Number
Diaframma / Pankow	"Circuito Chiuso"/"Wither"	7" ⁽¹⁾	1982	^{LACER 1}
Schleimer K / Neon	"The Mainline” / "The Ghost Dance"	7" ⁽²⁾	1983	^{LACER 2}
Federico Fiumani	Neogrigio	Book	1983	^{LACER 3}
Portion Control / Rinf / Die Form	“Dragdown” / “Bulldog” / "Autolyse-Masochist”	7" ⁽³⁾	1984	^{LACER 4}
Fra Lippo Lippi / Minox	“Leaving” / "Suite Maniacal"	7" ⁽⁴⁾	1985	^{LACER 7}
Minox	Lazare	Mini LP / CD / Cassette	1986/2008	^{LACER 9 / BA2}
Steven Brown	Brown Plays Tenco	LP / CD / Cassette ⁽⁵⁾	1987/2007	^{LACER 10 / BA1}
Rinf	Bang Bang	12"	1987	^{LACER 11}
Rinf	Rubber On Rider	12"	1987	^{LACER 13}
Dub Syndicate	Night Train	12"	1987	^{LACER W1}
Rosemary's Baby + Thee Temple Ov Psychick Youth	Psychic Baby (unreleased)	12"	1987	^{LACER 16}
Minox	MondoMinox (unreleased)	LP ⁽⁶⁾	1987	^{LACER 18}
Various Artists	At The End Of Modernity?	LP ⁽⁷⁾	2014	^{LACER BA3}
Rinf + Adrian Sherwood	Der Westen Ist Am Ende	LP ⁽⁸⁾	2016	^{LACER BA4}
The Anti B	The Pablo Shirt	Apparel	2017	^{LACER 22}
Various Artists	LB/R La Bellezza Riunita	LP+12" / CD ⁽⁹⁾	2018	^{LACER 20}
Various Artists	Architettura Sussurrante di Alessandro Mendini	LP / CD ⁽¹⁰⁾	1983/2019	^{LACER BA5}
Mauro Sabbione	Cinismo Abitativo	CD ⁽¹⁰⁾	2019	^{LACER 24}
Various Artists	LB/RE La Bellezza Riunita Eccetera	Cassette+Book	2019	^{LACER 21}

⁽¹⁾ Included in FREE8212 (magazine in sewn plastic sleeve with 7")
⁽²⁾ Included in FREE8303 (magazine in cardboard box with 7")
⁽³⁾ Included in FREE1984sect.1 (magazine in cardboard box with 7")
⁽⁴⁾ Included in FREE1985sect.2 (magazine in cardboard box with 7")
⁽⁵⁾ Chapter One of the IDL Classics series.
⁽⁶⁾ This completed album was never released. Two tracks (Limboland and Marching) surfaced on the compilation At the End of Modernity?
⁽⁷⁾ Features tracks by: Pankow, Twin Vision, Rosemary's Baby, Federico Fiumani, fm + Alex Spalck, Daniele Biagini, Minox, Blaine Reininger + Minox, Steven Brown.
⁽⁸⁾ Compiles the tracks from Lacer 11 and Lacer 13 in a single album
⁽⁹⁾ Chapter Two of the IDL Classics series, features tracks by: Daniele Biagini, Cristalli Liquidi, Pankow, Riva + Myss Keta, Rachele Bastreghi, Ernesto Tomasini + Man Parrish, Spartiti + DJ Rocca, Larsen + Little Annie, Federico Fiumani + Daniele Biagini, Little Annie, Backwords, The Love and Trust Collective, Alexander Robotnick + Bottin.
⁽¹⁰⁾ Revamped edition of the 1983 album originally (reluctantly) published by Ariston Dischi, features tracks by: Alessandro Mendini, Matia Bazar, MM, A, LDM, Magazzini Criminali. Digital Edition includes extra track.
^{(LACER 30)} Chapter Three of the IDL Classics series.

References[edit]

Federico Fiumani interview.^[1]
Paolo Cesaretti on Brown Plays Tenco.^[2]
Paolo Cesaretti on FREE.^[3]
Rachele Bastreghi, Federico Fiumani, Max Collini on La Bellezza Riunita.^[4]
LB/R La Bellezza Riunita on Discogs.^[5]

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[1] Fiumani in 1977 Magazine.

[2] Link di Sull'Amaca Blog.

[3] Link di Sull'Amaca Blog.

[4] "Il Tesoro Sommerso di Battisti" Rachele Bastreghi, Federico Fiumani, Max Collini talk about La Bellezza Riunita on Repubblica XL.

[5] LB/R on Discogs.

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