Casual listeners hastily assume Prog Rock is an apolitical genre (of course, the more informed listener knows better) but Italy's own Progressive scene thought different. Some of the prominent bands from the more avant-garde wing of their Progressive music scene strongly affiliated with the communist Rock in Opposition movement, most famously Area and the Stormy Six, but others on the furthest fringes of the genre sang from entirely different hymn sheet. You know, Fascism.
Janus, formerly Janum, were affiliated to the Neo-Fascist MSI party, regularly playing live at their amusingly-named "Hobbit Camps," named after the musician fellowship's shared interest in Tolkien. The band's history is somewhat turbulent. Most of the original copies of their album were destroyed in a fire at the only bookstore bold enough to sell their work. Their original guitarist was even killed in a political riot the year this album was released.
Recorded on a low budget, Al Maestrale sounds a little crummy in terms of production so doesn't come close to matching the Mussolinian bombast of Museo Rosenbach's Nietzschean masterwork Zarathustra. But the rawness of this recording is certainly a nice antidote to the slew of self-consciously 'pretty' bands who had sprung up in the scene. There are notably few symphonic influences, opting instead for a folk-tinged fuzzy hard rock style, not a world away from the early Black Widow. And some of the guitar playing on here is very mean indeed!
When it feels like there are few genuine obscurities in Prog left, it's nice to have something like this still out there, and the political affiliations gives this band a dangerous edge a lot of Prog admittedly lacks.
Copies of this album floating around online have it ripped at the wrong speed, which is why the instruments sound slightly higher in pitch than ideal.
