En and Xanax it is an atypical love song, in some ways surprising. A different song, where “different” stands for unusual, because it tells the story of two people who meet on common ground; or rather, to be precise, at the exact point where the ground falls away from under your feet and your breathing becomes short and panting: it is the terrain of anxiety, the disabling, suffocating and annihilating one, which cuts off the ways out and clearly highlights the panic, the sense of unease that derives from it, the fear.
The origins of the song
En and Xanax is a song by Samuele Bersani, dated 2013. The piece is part of the album Cloud number ninewhich is the literal translation of the expression “cloud nine“, which in English corresponds to our phrase “be in seventh heavenIt is no coincidence that this title explains how happiness is the leitmotif of the entire project: an adult, conscious, reasoned happiness. A happiness that is not sudden or improvised, but the result of a profound knowledge of one’s interiority and one’s gray areas.
It is no coincidence, therefore, that En and Xanax is part of this album, because it is an intense, raw song, although dressed in romanticism, capable of dragging the listener into an abyss and then accompanying him to safety. It is, in fact, the song of a saving love, but not in a strictly romantic sense: its protagonists are the ones who save themselves, the moment they learn to lay themselves bare, to recognize each other, to become each other’s twin anxiety.
Who I am En and Xanax
En and Xanax they are two well-known anxiolytics and Samuele Bersani has chosen to personify them (the woman is En and the man is Xanax) and, through this metaphor, tell their meeting, the way in which they met and recognized each other. Ex and
En and Xanax it is not an invitation to use psychotropic drugs, as some have absentmindedly thought, but the story of two people who learn to transform their discomfort into fertile ground where they can let a feeling grow – without hesitation, a place in which they no longer feel uncomfortable, but completely understood. Ex and Xanax are two ordinary people, who have learned to trust each other and keep each other’s anxiety at bay.
But, above all, they are two different people: she is “the daughter of an American transplanted to Rome” and he “a son of a bitch“, this is to explain that anxiety, with its symptoms and consequences, is a disease and, as such, can affect anyone: it has no predefined recipient and spares no one, at any age. It is a disease without contours, often intangible, and therefore underestimated, which can lead to the isolation of the person who suffers from it. But En and Xanax are no longer alone: their meeting has allowed them to feel understood, no longer mismatched, but complementary pieces of a world that made them feel at fault and that, more often than not, it got the better of them.
Text
The text of En and Xanax best summarizes Samuele Bersani’s songwriting style: it is suggestive and concrete, sharp and welcoming. The story of the two protagonists unfolds before the listener’s eyes as if it were the film of a film: it is a text made of clear and simple images, made powerful by a pressing pace and an open, airy and touching ending.
En and Xanax represents a watershed in the history of Italian song, because it tells of love, the most inflated theme in music and art in general, but it does so in a new, effective, extremely intelligent, not cumbersome and not at all wooden way. It is a necessary song, because it is extremely current, due to the theme it deals with; but, in the same way, it is timeless, because the story is poetic and enveloping, so much so that it has been compared to Anna and Marco by Lucio Dalla.
The text:
En and Xanax did not know each other before a common panic attack and immediately
They ran in unison
She is the daughter of an American transplanted to Rome and he
A son of a bitch
Now unemployed
En and Xanax calmed down
With their tongues to the taste of
Bitter medicine and cloves
She was on the street and he was stealing books from the library
And then he read them to her
Sitting on a hood
If you don’t scare yourself with my fears
One day you tell me yours we will find a way to remove them
Two can fight like giants against every pain
And you can count on me for a revolution
You have the soul that I would like to have
En and Xanax when they fought could even stop New York traffic
Killing yourself on the phone
She would calm down and he would find her naked in the chair
And then they superimposed the heartbeat
If you don’t scare yourself with my fears
One day you tell me yours we will find a way to remove them
Two can fight like giants against every pain
And you can count on me for a revolution
You have the soul that I would like to have
En and Xanax anesthetized themselves with their mint and marijuana flavored tongues
And then they fell asleep
And then they fell asleep
And then they fell asleep
And then they fell asleep
And then they fell asleep
And then they fell asleep
And then they fell asleep
Video
Here is the official video clip of the song by Samuele Bersani:
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