Review: LAURA PAUSINI - "Io canto 2" (Track by track)

There is something profoundly reassuring and at the same time slightly melancholic in seeing Laura Pausini return to inhabit the bodies of others, over twenty years after a first chapter that seemed to have already exhausted the discussion on her ability to absorb and reshape the national songbook.

“Io Canto 2” is not a gesture of rupture, but rather a more fan-like and sentimental maintenance operation. La Voce del pop italiano modifies the authorial ambition to become a human shield for a beauty that it perceives as threatened, quoting Rumi and invoking an immense field beyond good and evil, almost as if to legitimize a choice that, on a recording level, appears all too prudent.

If in the narration Pausini imagines himself as a Joan of Arc armed only with a microphone, listening instead returns a technical armor that is still intact, perhaps too lucid. A formal perfection that ends up anesthetizing precisely that revolutionary urgency of which the project would like to be the spokesperson. The album thus settles on a full, correct sufficiency, however without vertigo.

Duets, theoretically the beating heart of generational and cultural exchange, often slip into institutional courtesy.

But how cold it is with Annalisa, veering towards a smooth reggaeton, it loses the feverish angularity that made Nada untimely, resulting in an elegant but inoffensive exercise in style. More focused, however, is the almost liturgical respect of the virtual duet with Lucio Dalla in Happiness or the perfect version for Sanremo of March 16 with Achille Lauro.

Some production choices leave you perplexed: the 808 trap in How many keys appears redundant, while the guitar solos scattered here and there seem more like an affectation than a real expressive necessity. Likewise The good island of Madonna loses the synthetic and worldly malice of the original to settle into an overly composed vocal reading.

Clearly designed for the most devoted fandom, “Io Canto 2” is a polyglot catalog that crosses Giorgia, Zucchero, Marco Mengoni, Ornella Vanoni, Vasco, Bertè, Masini, Tozzi with almost academic care. But in an attempt to protect the music from a world perceived as hostile, he ends up locking it in a glass case, where the emotion is filtered through an impeccable yet predictable production.

What remains is the caliber of an interpreter who no longer has anything to prove. In this pilgrimage in the history of Italian music, however, Pausini seems to prefer the safety of the port to the storm of the open sea, delivering a heartfelt tribute, technically irreproachable, which shines more as a document than for real innovative force.

The Spanish version is a separate chapter: there the project appears more focused, supported by an international and Latin allure which gives the repertoire a less museum-like tension.

TRACK BY TRACK

1 RETURN TO LOVE (Biagio Antonacci) – 2001
A song by Biagio Antonacci that I loved deeply and which, since 2001, has been much more than a song for me: a companion, a guide. It marked a personal turning point, an urgent need to start over, to learn to love myself again.
I always find my strength only in music and this song talks about the love we should all give to ourselves.

2 ⁠QUANN CHIOVE (Pino Daniele) – 1980
I had already paid homage to Pino Daniele in the first Io canto con Quando, and having already sung with him on other occasions there had often been talk of other songs that we could perform in the future. He told me that he would have been curious to hear me sing this, and that's why in this case the tribute is even more heartfelt, and dedicated to him with a lot of love.

3 ⁠QUEM DE NÓS DOIS with Ana Carolina and Ferrugem (Ana Carolina) – 2001
Great songs must be listened to, sung and made to live forever, and in 2001 Ana Carolina wrote and performed an unreleased version of La mia storia tra le dita, which I wanted to pay homage to by singing it together with her and Ferrugem:, two iconic Brazilian voices in a trio meeting for the first time, uniting Italy and Brazil, a country to which I am very attached.

4 DETAILS (Ornella Vanoni) 1973
A song by Roberto Carlos, one of the Brazilian authors most loved by our great Ornella, which many years ago I sang in an evening with friends in Forte Dei Marmi, I sang in front of her. From that moment on, every time I met her she always asked me “When will you record Details for me?”

5 ⁠IMENSELY (Umberto Tozzi) – 1987
Choosing a song by Umberto Tozzi wasn't easy for me because I've always been a fan of his, but having recently had the opportunity to sing live with him I love you, The others are us and You can give more, I chose this song from 1987 that I've always loved deeply: Umberto's voice is unique and technically very complicated due to the range it has. It was therefore even more exciting to pay homage to him. A song that tells of a deep love, between desire, loneliness and the impossibility of staying together but living in the immense.

6 16 MARCH with Achille Lauro (Achille Lauro) – 2020
The first time I heard this song I wrote to Lauro to ask him to write me one as similar as possible, given how fascinated I was by it. When I started thinking about the list of songwriters to pay homage to, I wrote to him to ask him if he wanted to sing it with me. This song allowed us to get to know each other even better and amplify the connection between us.

7 YOU CHOSEN ME (Sugar) – 1987
This song is an intimate, sweet and silent poem that Zucchero gave us in 1987: I fell in love with it and decided to interpret it, letting my heart sing with great sincerity. I have always followed Adelmo's career and I have tried various songs from his repertoire. For now this one has won, due to the personal meaning it has for me, but I am sure I want to pay homage to him again in the future.

8 LA ISLA BONITA (Madonna) – 1986
An iconic song by Madonna from 1986, which smells of freedom and has always evoked feelings of joy in me. I have always sung this song, a symbol of escape and freedom and, being Madonna of Italian origins, I couldn't help but include it in my tribute album.
A way to thank her for when in 2004 she wrote one of the songs included in my album Stay listening, it was a real honor and I'm still grateful to her.

9 AND THEN (Giorgia) – 1994
An intense ballad that tells the end of a love that kills the heart, in the silence of the night that never passes. When Giorgia wrote and sang this song in Sanremo in 1994, we all fell in love with her voice and her artistic sensitivity. It's a song that has been part of my life ever since and forever.

10 HAPPINESS with Lucio Dalla (Lucio Dalla) – 1988
Interpreting Felicità with the unique voice of Lucio Dalla was a special way to dialogue with his extraordinary art and revive the emotions of this timeless classic. I was very close to Lucio who was also the first famous Italian artist to compliment me when I was playing piano in Bologna and I hadn't yet turned 10. I will never forget his words from then which I keep in my moments of happiness.

11 JÁ SEI NAMORAR (Tribalistas) – 2002
Maybe you are wondering why I included this Brazilian song in the tribute album to Italian singer-songwriters; Marisa Monte, female voice and author of Tribalistas, has Italian origins. Anyone who knows me knows that I feel like I was Brazilian in my previous life and this song from 2002, which also had great success in Italy, contains a sunny and carefree aspect, a positivity and a joy, which I find every time I land in that magical land.

12 MA HOW COLD IS IT with Annalisa (Nada) – 1969
But what's cold is a melancholy song, which tells what life is like without love, with the cold as a metaphor for absence: a tree that no longer has leaves. I have always loved Nada's voice, her way of being sums up a great personality. And I have always loved women in Italian music with a strong character, which is why I wanted Annalisa by my side, who reminds me how important it is for us artists not to forget who brought us this far. The arrangement of this song unites various worlds: reggaeton, the Arab world and clearly Italian writing.

13 A SENSE (Vasco Rossi) – 2004
Vasco Rossi is for me the greatest artist we have in Italy, the first record I bought in my life was Gli Spari Sopra, the first autograph I asked for was his, which I keep, written on the postcard of the restaurant where I used to play piano – now exhibited in the Laura Pausini Official Museum (ed) – and I feel honored to be his friend as well as his huge fan. I consulted with him on the choice of song to perform for Io canto 2, having already paid homage to him with Anima fragili in Io canto in 2006. I auditioned more than 10 of his songs, I chose the one with the lyrics to which I feel most connected, and which really makes sense with my life.

14 I AM NOT A LADY (Loredana Bertè) – 1982
Paying homage to Loredana Bertè with a cover has always been a great desire of mine, I hadn't yet recorded any of her songs on one of my albums but I've been singing it at home and also in my concerts for 30 years. Even in this case, choosing a title was very complicated, I did various auditions, and I chose a piece that was also very successful in the Spanish version on the other side of the world. When I sent it to Loredana a few months ago to get her opinion, I felt very loved and protected by her strength, a strength which, as we know, is not just vocal.

15 WE WOULD LIKE THE SEA (Marco Masini) -1990
I have an important bond with Marco Masini and this song of his from 1990 belongs to my voice in a visceral and natural way. Marco is also a great friend of mine and he was one of the first to know about this project and he personally helped me make the demo of what would later become this tribute to him.

16 LA DERNIÈRE CHANSON (TWO LIVES) with Julien Lieb (Marco Mengoni) – 2023
When Marco Mengoni presented Due vite at the Sanremo Festival in 2023 I immediately thought that it was an important and timeless song. His writing represents contemporary Italian pop music and I liked the idea that there were also more current homages on the record.