Banco del Mutuo Soccorso

Banco del Mutuo Soccorso is a rock band founded in Rome in 1969 and still in business. Together with the PFM and Le Orme is the most representative and well known abroad, the Italian progressive rock.

The story of the “Banco del Mutuo Soccorso” began in late 1968, when the seventeen year old Victor Nocenzi, enfant prodigy-keyboards, managed to obtain a hearing before the major label RCA, stronger signal Gabriella Ferri, for which he already set to music excerpts. Record companies were, in those years, reluctant to promote solo instrumentalists, and legend has it that Nocenzi had vaunted the existence of an unspecified group he headed. It found, therefore, in a position to set up in a hurry to present a musical audition. Purpose recruited relatives and friends able to “hold an instrument” and invented the name of Banco, perhaps inspired by any bank or insurance zone

The group met in their own rehearsal room, to Marino, in the Castelli Romani, which later became known as the “stable” and so it was in reality a real barn renovated and fully equipped (himself says Victor Nocenzi in an interview) “with the mangers filled with amplifiers, distortion and musical instruments instead of hay for the cows”

The first line was composed, in addition to Victor and his brother Gianni Nocenzi the piano, by Gianfranco Coletta (component of Chetro & Co. and, later, the Alumni of the Sun) on guitar, bass and Mario Fabrizio Falco Achilli on drums, these components of the psychedelic rock group Crash founded by brothers Hawk, with whom Victor collaborating for several months. The hearing examiners and obtained the consent of the child “Banco” created three songs that were included in a compilation of new formations called “’70 Sound” and released only on cassette. The pieces in this collection (I see the phone, my freedom, and Father Francis) will be engraved, a few weeks after the audition, a training already retouched, with Claudio Franco Pontecorvi Falco on guitar and drums

The seventies

In 1971 the Banco participated, with little luck, the # 2 Pop Festival Caracalla in Rome. Among the groups who attended the festival were the experiences and wildflowers that had already released one single (outside the city / two children in the yard with the label Apollo ZA-50014). The time to socialize and, at the end of the event, the Banco had assumed its final formation, incorporating Francesco Di Giacomo, Renato D’Angelo and Pierluigi Calderoni, respectively, vocals, bass and drums group experiences, as well as Marcello Todaro, guitarist of Campo dei Fiori. It was a real qualitative change: the group passed by the songs of the first period, beat, progressive compositions, classical music strongly influenced by the formation of the brothers Nocenzi refined and embellished by texts written by Francesco Di Giacomo

The group participated, with the addition of another guitarist (Claudio Accarino, part of the group from 1970 to the end of 1972), the second edition of “Festival of avant-garde and new trends”, held in Rome at the Villa Pamphili from 1 to June 4, 1972, finishing tied for first place with the Circus 2000

This formation released their debut album in 1972, Banco, which, with songs such as RIP (Requiescant in peace), the long suites, The garden of the magician and Metamorphosis, a short but beautiful instrumental insert final vowel, catalyzed the immediate attention of the public of the emerging Italian progressive rock scene. Also very special artwork on the cover of the vinyl, shaped like a clay piggy bank.
In the same year the second album was released, Darwin!, The first concept album released by the group: all the songs are in fact linked to the central theme of the theory of evolution of species by Charles Darwin.
These two albums can be considered the most creative and original group, focusing on the dizzying and virtuosic interweaving of keyboards and the inimitable brothers Nocenzi tenor registers Di Giacomo, the service of a peculiar cross between the English prog-rock, the sounds of the Mediterranean and the tradition of Italian opera, which peeps out in the most unexpected moments.
The first turnover occurred in the formation of the group in 1973, when Todaro was replaced on guitar by Rodolfo Maltese, coming from a Homo sapiens. I was born in the Free (1973) Maltese formally appeared as a guest, but in fact was a member of the Bank.
In 1974, on a proposal by Greg Lake, the Bank abandoned Remember to switch Manticore label, owned by the British group Emerson, Lake & Palmer, which was also merged PFM. In 1975 the album was released Tour (also known as Tour IV), which shows in English for the foreign market, the best songs of the first three albums (similar to the operation of the PFM Photos of Ghosts). The album was critically acclaimed both in Italy and abroad.

In 1976 he was posted as in a last supper, sponsored by a European tour that saw the bench to play as a supporter of a “giant” of the English progressive rock, Gentle Giant, of which the Roman group, however, was a more than credible version ” Mediterranean “with the same trend, at least in the early years of his career, to elaborate and refined arrangements and the internal structure of the pieces totally unrelated song format. This album was made is also a version in English (As In A Last Supper), with the translation of Angelo Branduardi.

In the same year the group also recorded Red Carnation, the soundtrack in the film (based on a novel by Elio Vittorini, directed by Luigi Faccini). This is the first instrumental album of the Bank, which opened a new era in the evolution of the band’s style. Again instrumental, sounding even more complex, was the next … of land, which were explored solutions that trespassed from rock to jazz and classical music. This complex construction, the Bank took advantage of the contribution of the Symphony Orchestra Musicians Union in Rome, directed by Antonio Scarlato professor of composition at the Conservatorio Santa Cecilia in Rome, in addition to the collaboration of keyboardist Alessandro Essene.

From … of land, the name Banco was formally replaced with the short bench, now widely used by journalists and fans.

The seventies Banco closed with another acclaimed album, Song of Spring, with its evocative atmosphere of ethnic and pastoral. On this album John Colaiacomo Kaleidon the successor to the bottom, replacing D’Angelo.

The eighties

The first job of the Bank in the eighties was a live album (the first) entitled Terminal, where the group reviews the salient features of its history. Conceptually sealing his “first era”, the Bank prepared this album to a change of course in particular the abandonment of certain typical patterns of progressive rock of the seventies, in particular in relation to the structural complexity (and the length in minutes ) songs, songs in favor of relatively simple and straightforward. This trend is well represented by the first two albums of the decade, Urgent (1980) and Good News (1981). During this period, training was enriched by Karl Potter on drums, musician of color who had previously worked with Pino Daniele and that helped give more punch to the rhythm section of the Tour.
The album appeared in 1983 Tour, which is another turning point because of the defection of Nocenzi Gianni, who left the band to pursue a solo career and work with the Japanese Akai as a test of keyboards and samplers.
In 1985 the Bank acquired a new component of leading, multi-instrumentalist Gabriel Amato, former band member of Aretha Franklin. The result was the album … and Via (1985) and participation in the Festival of Sanremo, but displeased many fans, who struggled to recognize the spirit of the Tour of the past. He therefore opened a period of crisis which led to several years of silence, interrupted only exit of Do not put your fingers in the nose, the first solo album of Francesco Di Giacomo, who participated as musicians, however, all members of the last training the Bank.
In 1989 it was finally published Plautilla Woman, a collection of unreleased songs of the seventies.

The nineties

In the early nineties, following what was in fact an example of many progressive rock band “classic”, the Bank initiated a revival of his first period, returning to the name Banco and bringing on tour songs of the seventies.
Later it was released a box set (shaped like a piggy bank, calling the debut album cover), containing the first two albums, Banco and Darwin! re-recorded in the studio with new arrangements.
Also in the line of revival style (albeit with completely new content) was 13 of The (1994). Three members of the group’s historical Nocenzi Vittori, Francesco Di Giacomo and Rodolfo Maltese, together with the young guitarist Philip Roman Marcheggiani Acoustic embarked in the draft, in which several songs were reinterpreted classics unplugged. During this period, the Bank also undertook several world tours and touched Japan, Mexico, United States, Brazil and Panama. From one of the most successful concerts (in Japan, 25 and May 26, 1997) was suddenly the live album Naked (which also included a new song of the same name).
At no stage followed Nude (2003), a live album in celebration of the thirtieth anniversary of the band, seeing as guests the likes of Morgan, Mauro Pagani, Federico Zampaglione (Tiromancino), Gianni Nocenzi, Eugene Kelly, Philip Gatti, Angelo Branduardi for a series of successful concerts.