7/10

With his newest record '21 grammi', Giuseppe Cucè opens a door to a place where memory, longing, and rebirth flicker like candlelight on old film. Cucè has always been a storyteller with a flair for the intimate, but here he leans in deeper. Inspired by the myth that the soul has weight, the album unfolds like an autopsy of the unseen, where all the feelings we hold, all the burdens we swallow, and all the hopes that refuse to die even in the darkest hours come to the surface.

Across nine tracks, the artist builds a sonic ritual. Each piece feels like a room with its own light source: some lit only by a match, others glowing with morning warmth. Tracks like 'Fragile equilibrio' offer a gentle sway between doubt and tenderness, while opener 'È tutto così vero' pulses with earthy intensity, a reminder of how desire and vulnerability often collide.

Cucè’s textured and deliberate voice sits at the centre, sometimes trembling as if brushing against its own truth. Lyrically, he strips away grand gestures in favour of quiet revelations. Nothing is overstated; and everything is felt.

Producer Riccardo Samperi frames these songs with a palette that blurs the divine and the earthly. Acoustic instruments breathe alongside soft electronic shadows, creating an atmosphere that feels simultaneously timeless and contemporary. There’s a cinematic quality to the arrangements, as if each song is a close-up shot revealing another layer of the protagonist’s inner world.

What makes '21 grammi' extraordinary is its humanity. It’s an album that holds space for contradiction between passion and fragility. The title becomes a metaphor for everything within us that persists: the ache of love, the resonance of grief, and the quiet spark that keeps us reaching toward the light.