Ibiza has much on its mind of late, but whilst it ruminates so the island’s Italian contingent – both artist and audience – continues to swell and more forcefully underpin its best parties. Italo-house legend Claudio Coccoluto’s impending performance at Booom Ibiza night Glitterbox is a glittering case in point; but also a hugely interesting development. That Coccoluto makes his high-profile appearance there on 23 August reflects a recent renaissance of Italian house output, in contrast to the tougher techno sounds of many of his compatriots.
A summary of Italian influence on the White Isle is probably best to start with DJ Pippi. Born in Ruffano, southern Italy in 1956, Pippi pursued his love soul, funk and nu-electronic across Switzerland and Germany before visiting Ibiza at the tail-end of the Seventies. He was sold on the island’s magic and perfect, organic setting for truly open-minded dance music, and soon engineered gigs at key club of the time Glories (featuring soulful grooves, proto-house and a generous helping of Rod Stewart). By 1984, he’d become Pacha’s primary resident, peddling a smart, yet divergent mix of everything from Grace Jones and Sade to emergent house faves Frankie Knuckles and Georgie Red. Under his captainship, Pacha kick-started a groundbreaking new era in Ibiza’s music history and constantly amazed its audiences.
Pippi’s, in fact, was the pure ‘Ibiza sound’ – a free-range sweep of emotive, danceable tunes anchored to the fast-rising (and equally soulful) house kick. As his reputation grew, so did that of the island. “The atmosphere and the vibe, the visual aspect. It [Pacha] was unique,” he once commented. “It’s hard to explain. It’s still special, but it’s ten times bigger now. It was natural and full of love and peace. The people that came there were liberated and they only came there to dance and enjoy themselves and go crazy about the music.”
Pippi’s first stint at Pacha ended in 1987, paving the way for a residency at Ku (precursor to Privilege) and then, when that closed, a return to Pacha where he played consistently until the mid-Noughties – further enhancing his legend. Coccoluto enjoys similar status today, and a similar historical context. He, too, was raised in the boundary-less dance culture of the Eighties. “You were halfway between a jukebox and a radio” he recalled in one interview. “Everybody on the dancefloor would be calling out requests, or the owner would tell you what to play. ‘Dance music’ meant Michael Jackson or a Madonna song. Everything started with house music. People in Europe – especially in Italy – didn’t understand what was happening. But I understood. I was buying everything that arrived from the US.”
Coccoluto drove the Italian scene onwards, smashing key parties such as Pussy Galores, Ecu and Zen and then, even more significantly, establishing seminal Naples night Angels Of Love and helming Rome’s Goa Club. His sound – a bold and passionate marriage of old-school US 4-4, Euro-beat, World music and future-facing electronica – also earned him spots at the world’s biggest clubs including those in Ibiza. Memorably, ‘Cocco’ stormed the 2004 closing parties for both Pacha and Amnesia. But is now, in 2014, that he makes something of a grand return to the island. Coccoluto has played there sporadically over the years but his appearance at Glitterbox is a major statement.
An even bigger one when you consider the proliferation of tougher Italian sounds on the island today. If Pippi and Cocco are reminding us of Italy’s classic Ibizan past (a past also including the warm, jazz-flecked likes of Dino Lenny, the Pasta Boys, Bini & Martini, Joe T Vanelli, Alex Neri and Ricky Montanari – all over the past two decades or so) then Marco Carola undoubtedly leads the dominant White Isle line in terms of underground techno and grittier house hustle.
Carola’s emergence in recent years, both on and off the island, has been incredible. Hailing from Napoli, the 39-year-old DJ-producer initially thrived within the flourishing Napolitano techno scene of the early Nineties – gigs leading to studio releases on M-Nus and Plus 8 2M, as well as the creation of his own labels including Zenit and Music On. It was back-to-back Ibizan residencies with Cocoon at Amnesia across 2010 and 2011 however that fired his career to the next level. In turn, Carola has confidently struck out alone with his own Music On residency at the very same venue. Music On is at the top of the pile when it comes to conveying Ibiza’s current favoured assault of adrenaline-pumped techno grooves.
Meanwhile, Naples confidantes Random/Noize and Davide Squillace have also enjoyed greater attention. The latter, in particular, is a Balearic kingpin these days, dropping taut yet immersive 4-4 to a wide variety of summer dancefloors – this season, alone, Squillace is enrapturing Amnesia (he played the season opener) DC-10 (he’s playing as senior resident for Circoloco – one of the island’s defining modern day brands – and as one third of techno triumvirate Better Lost Than Stupid for Movement) and Space (Carl Cox’s Revolutionresidency). That inherent Italian passion for quality underground dance music can be felt everywhere on the island.
Over the years, too, the Italian public, recovered from their initial confusion over the original house and techno revolution, has enthusiastically embraced dance music and made nearby Ibiza their holiday home from home – a further, highly noticeable ramp up of that unique, lowdown fervour. The Italian clubbers’ invasion of Ibiza has become a well-chronicled August ritual fuelling the absolute peak of the season. Coccoluto puts it thus: “Italians go to Ibiza for a week, and they come back and talk about it for a month. Which DJs they saw, who played a wicked set, it’s like the football!”
So who are Italy’s other top strikers on the island? The revitalisation of veterans like Pippi and ‘Cocco’ as pure purveyors of house music coincides with (and perhaps intensifies) the glitzy cut ‘n’ thrust of Supernova (allied to Kehakuma’s mash-up with ElRow) and arrival of quirky, genre-less talents such as Tale Of Us and DJ Tennis. The former, duo Carmine ‘Karm’ Conte and Matteo Milleri (born in Toronto and New York respectively, but raised in Milan from a young age), have blasted house’s existing remit wide open over the past three or four years; cleverly infusing it with elements of pop, rock, funk and nu-disco. It’s game-changing stuff, reinforced by top-tier DJ slots this season at ENTER and Circoloco. Tennis, real name Manfredi Romano, has recently played Pacha, Sankeys Ibiza and ENTER. Romano, offering another indescribable, soulfully dense fusion of house, tech, pop and future-disco, solidifies the view that Italy’s already sizeable Ibizan stock is rising quickly in value.
And diversifying. The relentless pulse of Pirupa’s monster hit ‘Party Non Stop’ is still ringing in our ears, as is the looser, anthemic swing of Flashmob’s ‘Need In Me’. Both are Italian productions, through and through, boasting undeniable White Isle pedigree and neatly epitomising the different directions in which the island’s integral Italian community are now heading. Both have their place, and both are loudly thumping at the heart of clubland.
Words: Ben Lovett
Claudio Coccoluto plays Glitterbox at Booom Ibiza 23 August – click for full line-up and tickets
Defected presents Glitterbox Ibiza 2014 is out 11 August (digital) on Defected Records - order from iTunes
