Occidentali's Karma

Occidentali's Karma
Francesco Gabbani
publication	February 9, 2017
length	3:37
Genre (s)	pop
text	Francesco Gabbani, Fabio Ilacqua, Luca Chiaravalli
music	Francesco Gabbani, Filippo Gabbani, Luca Chiaravalli
Publisher (s)	BMG Rights Management
Label	BMG Rights Management
album	Magellano

Occidentali's Karma is a pop song by the Italian musician Francesco Gabbani from 2017. It was composed and written by Gabbani, his brother Filippo as well as by Fabio Ilacqua and Luca Chiaravalli. Gabbani won the Sanremo Festival 2017 with the title and reached sixth place for his home country Italy at the Eurovision Song Contest 2017 in May 2017 .

background

Francesco Gabbani won the newcomer category at the 2015 Sanremo Festival with the song Amen and thus achieved greater fame for the first time. Songwriter Fabio Ilacqua was also involved at the time. On December 11, 2016, Gabbani was announced as a participant in the Sanremo Festival, now in the main category. He presented his song for the first time on February 8, 2017, the second evening of the competition. He was accompanied on stage by the choreographer Filippo Ranaldi in a gorilla costume, who artistically implemented the line of text La scimmia nuda balla . In the final on February 11, 2017, Gabbani finally prevailed against Fiorella Mannoia and Ermal Meta . With the victory in Sanremo, Gabbani also received the option to compete in the Eurovision Song Contest in May 2017, which he accepted that same night.

On April 26, Gabry Ponte released an official remix of the song.

content

The original title was Occidentalis Karma , Latin for "Western Karma"; this was later anglicized with an English genitive at the suggestion of lyricist Fabio Ilacqua . The text contains numerous cultural allusions ranging from the civilizations of the East to Greek philosophy . A recurring quote is La scimmia nuda , based on the book The Naked Ape by Desmond Morris , in which humans are described as primate without fur, but with behaviors comparable to apes; Morris himself praised the song:

“Gabbani’s gestures on stage and in the video are outstanding in the way he combines and harmonizes cultures and different quotations. Then I read through the text of the song and was fascinated by its beauty, culture and the richness of the quotations. I've never heard anything like it, except from Bob Dylan and John Lennon . "

- Desmond Morris

At the beginning of the song on is Shakespeare Hamlet and his utterance to be or not be played (essere o dover essere / il dubbio amletico) , wherein the-present in modern society cleavage between the need for introspection and the importance is emphasized of the external appearance. Other important references are the aphorism panta rhei from Heraclitus , Buddha and nirvana from the tradition of the East, as well as the internet , which is called coca dei popoli / oppio dei poveri , again an allusion to Marx 's designation of religion as the opium of the people .

Musical structure

The song consists of two stanzas, each followed by a pre-chorus and a refrain. After the bridge and a short guitar solo , the refrain is repeated a third time. In the shortened version for the ESC the complete second verse is missing.

Commercial win

On February 12, 2017, the associated video (director: Gabriele Lucchetti) was viewed 4,353,802 times on the VEVO video platform within one day, more than any other Italian song before. With more than 104 million clicks (as of April 30, 2017), it also developed into the most watched ESC video of all time, even before the start of the competition. On February 16, 2017, the song entered the Italian singles chart at number one and was awarded a gold record in its first week . After seven weeks, the song was awarded triple platinum.

Charts	Top position	Weeks
Italy	1	19th
Austria	57	1
Switzerland	25th	4th

Web links

• Video on YouTube

supporting documents

1. ↑ Elena Masuelli: Festival di Sanremo 2017, big e giovani: ecco tutti i cantanti in gara. In: LaStampa.it . December 12, 2016, accessed December 13, 2016 (Italian). 
2. ^ Francesco Prisco: È il Sanremo di "Occidentali's Karma": Gabbani vince a sorpresa davanti a Mannoia e Meta. In: ilsole24ore.com . February 12, 2017. Retrieved March 17, 2017 . 
3. ↑ Francesco Gabbani - Occidentali's Karma - Gabry Ponte Remix on YouTube
4. ^ Francesco Gabbani: Quella scimmia non è Eraclito. In: Repubblica.it . February 21, 2017. Retrieved February 22, 2017 . 
5. ^ Cos'è La scimmia nuda, il libro di Desmond Morris citato da Gabbani. In: DAILYBEST. February 13, 2017. Retrieved February 15, 2017 . 
6. ^ Antonio Guerrera: Desmond Morris e Sanremo: “Perfetta la mia scimmia cantata da Gabbani”. In: Repubblica.it. February 24, 2017. Retrieved February 25, 2017 . 
7. ↑ Il significato di “Occidentali's Karma” è molto più profondo di quanto si possa pensare. In: Huffington Post. Retrieved February 15, 2017 . 
8. ↑ Video on YouTube
9. ↑ Record! “Occidentali's Karma” è il video italiano più visto in un solo giorno su Vevo in assoluto! (No longer available online.) In: FrancescoGabbani.com. BMG Rights Management, archived from the original on March 17, 2017 ; Retrieved March 17, 2017 (Italian). Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
10. ↑ Padraig Muldoon: Francesco Gabban's Occidentali's Karma is the most watched Eurovision video ever. In: Wiwibloggs.com. April 8, 2017, accessed May 1, 2017 . 
11. ↑ Awards archive . FIMI, accessed April 28, 2017 (Italian). 
12. ^ Archivio classifiche Top Digital. FIMI , accessed March 17, 2017 (Italian). 
13. ^ Francesco Gabbani - Occidentali's Karma. In: hitparade.ch . Hung Medien, accessed March 17, 2017 . 

predecessor	status	successor
Nessun grado di separazione ( Francesca Michielin )	Italy at the Eurovision Song Contest 2017	Non mi avete fatto niente ( Ermal Meta , Fabrizio Moro )