Reflex

Francesco Messina is perhaps best known for his collaboration with fellow composer Raul Lovisoni on the album Prati Bagnati Del Monte Analogo, originally released on seminal Italian label Cramps in 1979. Along with contemporaries Franco Battiato, Juri Camisasca and Giusto Pio, Messina would help reshape the world of modern composition with an organic rawness and haunting beauty
Unreleased for over thirty years, the recordings on Reflex have an unadorned, almost improvisational feel. “Untitled” (featuring Lovisoni’s plaintive flute) and “I Nuovi Pescheti” are full of meditative piano passages that lend an aura of new age, while the title track is more insistent with unfurling chords layered in real time via a reel-to-reel tape machine, resembling Steve Reich’s mesmeric phase-shifting works of the ’60s
A central figure within the Italian avant-garde, Francesco Messina gracefully expands his country’s contribution to Minimalism. This first-time vinyl release is recommended for fans of Joanna Brouk, Luciano Cilio and Charlemagne Palestine