How cool that the things we like become a habit, like eating delicious pasta with the family on Sundays. Of course, that’s not the only good Italian habit that we’re acquiring… It’s that, in the last decade, we’ve become a fan of Italian HIT Week, that unique platform that becomes a wonderful showcase to introduce new music from Italy to US audiences.
Last year we had the chance to see the talented Diodato and Cosmo playing live in Miami. And now, at Italian HIT Week 2023, we’ll welcome the successful indie pop duo Coma Cose and the alt-folk poet-singer-songwriter Gio Evan, two artists who know what it is to make a hit: both were selected to perform at the legendary Sanremo Music Festival, as part of that long Italian tradition of searching for the perfect song. Additionally, as the opening act, we’ll have the young promise of electronic music Kyotolp. Learn more about the October 14th showcase and grab your free tickets here. And while you get to know the artists who will be in attendance, hit shuffle on our Mi Scusi playlist to set the tone.
Coma Cose
The story that brought together Fausto “Lama” Zanardelli and Francesca “California” Mesiano, the couple that makes up the Milanese duo Coma Cose, is a story that brings out the magic of destiny and the push of resurrection. The thing is that, around the time they met, Fausto was coming off a significant failure, that of his solo project Edipo, just after signing a contract with a major label and releasing an album that didn’t work. “I was stuck, without money, and I lost my desire,” he told the Italian newspaper Corriere Della Sera. So, with his career on pause, he went to work in a gift shop in Porta Ticinese. But everything changed when his co-worker Francesca, a former DJ, convinced him to return to music.
With melodies that grow and unfold giant choruses, Coma Cose never gives up that chemistry achieved between the voices of California and Fausto. Heartfelt songs, polished by electropop precision, endowed with an indie sensibility and sometimes emboldened by their rapping in Italian. That coup de effect is what has made the duo bigger and bigger since their appearance on the scene, back in 2017, first in Milan and then in the rest of Italy, becoming the opening act for Phoenix in 2018 and releasing their debut album Hype Aura in 2019. They released two more albums: Nostralgia (2021) and Un Meraviglioso Modo di Salvarsi (2022), both with songs that took them to the Sanremo Festival.
Gio Evan
Giovanni Giancaspro, better known by his artistic alias Gio Evan, is a writer, poet and singer-songwriter – he also likes to add the roles of philosopher and comedian to his bio. Originally from Bari, in the Italian region of Puglia, he wrote his first book when he was twenty, Il Florilegio Passato, a collection of verses about his trip to India that he edited and distributed at his own expense. He continued his life traveling, through Europe and South America. He set up street art projects and edited more books, both novels and poetry. Motivated by his growing popularity on social networks, he ventured to record his first album, Biglietto di Solo Ritorno, finally released in 2018. The following year, he went even further with his songwriting and released a new album, Natura Molta.
Gio Evan never stopped writing and publishing books, but his musical career definitely took a bigger leap and became a priority at the end of 2020, when he was announced to perform at the legendary Sanremo Festival the following year. It was all thanks to the hit song “Arnica”, written by him and produced by Katoo, released as an advance single from his most recent album, 2021’s Mareducato. Last year he remained active with the singles “Hopper” and “De Dominicis”. And this 2023 he continues to release more new music.
Kyotolp
Kyotolp is the stage name that Roberta Russo chose for her electronic song project created just three years ago, during the pandemic, with the intention of experimenting as much as possible. Producer, beatboxer, drummer and singer, she stopped being an open secret when she won the Dubito 2022 Award. “My music is characterized by the fusion of the beatbox technique with dark and cinematic electronica. Singing and spoken music meet different musical instruments from various traditions, including that of the Puglia region, which represents me,” she said during an interview for the Lega Italiana Poetry Slam. The thing is that, although she was raised in Monza until she was 17, her heart was always in the south of Italy, in Puglia, the region of origin of her parents where she moved.
Living in Bari for years, Roberta took advantage of the lockdown in 2020 to pause her prominent career as a drummer and give free rein to something much more personal. The uniqueness of Kyotolp lies in the fact that the songs are performed live almost exclusively with the voice and a loop station, using the beatbox technique in live performances without the help of pre-recorded sequences. In short, his voice is the true protagonist of an essentially electronic project. “La Frontiera” was his first single, released that same year and focused on the topic of immigration. The following year he released another song of his, “Primavera 21”, and a cover by the Italian eighties band CCCP “Curami”. This year she got together with her friends Luk and Riva to leave electronics aside and record an unplugged in a kitchen called “Mashup Sanremo”.
