On 21, 22 and 23 July ROAM returns, three days of international alternative music in the intimate and enveloping atmosphere of Parco Ciani. A stage close to the public and an audience close to the artists, to fully experience the experience of music played live.
We talk about it with Filippo Corbella, artistic director of ROAM.
What does ROAM mean?
In English the verb to roam means to wander. The festival was born from the previous Rock and More, and the name was chosen to recall what happened in the days of assembly and soundcheck inside the Parco Ciani: many passers-by and tourists stopped, intrigued by the movement and asked what was happening; they were then surprised to discover which artists were on the bill, and who played in that context. The idea is precisely that by going around randomly, wandering in a somewhat mysterious naturalistic setting, among trees and bushes, one arrives at a very special musical situation.
Since the first edition, ROAM has brought quality and alternative music to the stage, which indicates not so much a musical genre as the whole alternative world to the dominant recording system. Over the years we have brought Mark Lanegan, Mac De Marco, Cigarettes After Sex, Aurora, Mogwai, Slowdive, Apparat, to name just a few: not niche musicians, but international artists with a wide-ranging musical dimension.
ROAM has reached its fifth edition: three days and six artists on the international scene. The first guest is Max Gazzè, a famous Roman singer-songwriter and bassist.
After two years of pandemic we have decided to go back in a big way and further open the range of the musical proposal. We chose to open with Max Gazzè, an artist with a unique style that fully reflects the quality characteristics of the festival.
Friday evening Frah Quintale, singer-songwriter and rapper, and Joan Thiele, singer-songwriter and producer will take the stage. What will the sounds of the evening be?
Frah Quintale is an important figure on the Italian scene, who is looking beyond the Italian borders; his concert will be between Hip hop and R & B, with flashes of songwriting and pop. Joan Thiele takes her first steps from a recording point of view, but she has already done several things, such as the collaboration with Myss Keta and the successful cover of a Drake song. He is an artist with a multi-ethnic nature (Italian mother, Swiss father, he lived in Colombia, Canada, England), he has traveled a lot and this can be heard in his music: a contemporary R & B, with a strong vocal importance, immediately recognizable.
The final evening will see electronic music by the Americans Son Lux and the Belgian Hilke, but also the acoustics of South African Alice Phoebe Lou.
Son Lux is a post rock and art pop band – that neat and clean pop with lots of electronic influences. A very prolific band, with 8 studio albums, two of which are very successful. It will be a concert with very deep sounds, and a lot of electronics. Alice Phoebe Lou brings classical, ethereal, aquatic indie music; he made her first important musical steps in Berlin, and her song “She” was nominated for Best Original Song at the Academy Awards in 2017. Hilke, a former member of the Belgian dream pop group Amatorski, has released some electronic songs under the name Hroski. She now she introduces herself in all honesty with her name: Hilke. Even in her case, her voice is always the dominant actor of a deep electro / dream pop scene.
More information: roamfestival.ch
