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Francesco, Rachele and Claudio.

"I love you. I love you but I hate you but I love you all.
Is it good or bad? I don't know."
— "Un romantico a Milano"

Baustelle are an Italian indie rock band originally formed in Montepulciano, a town in the province of Siena, Tuscany. Since 2005 their core lineup has consisted of Francesco Bianconi (lead vocals, keyboards, guitars), Rachele Bastreghi (co-lead vocals, keyboards, drums) and Claudio Brasini (lead guitars).

Discography:

  • Sussidiario illustrato della giovinezzanote  (2000)
  • La moda del lentonote  (2003)
  • La malavitanote  (2005)
  • Amen (2008)
  • I mistici dell'Occidentenote  (2010)
  • Fantasmanote  (2013)
  • L'amore e la violenzanote  (2017)
  • L'amore e la violenza - Vol. 2note  (2018)
  • Elvis (2023)

She left you a child, Foster Wallace, three jumpers, and these tropes:

  • Arc Words: The words "amore" (love) and "violenza" (violence) reappear in "Betty", "Eurofestival" and "Jesse James e Billy Kid", from L'amore e la violenza and L'amore e la violenza - Vol. 2 (in the case of "Betty" it's a proper Album Title Drop). They also reappear in "Lili Marleen"note  and, obliquely, in "Ragazzina" (with the lyric "little soldier of love and war").
  • Bait-and-Switch: In "Un romantico a Milano":
    Out of the Manzonis, I prefer the true one:
    Piero.note 
  • Celebrity Song:
    • "La canzone di Alain Delon", "Baudelaire", "San Francesco", "Amanda Lear", "Jesse James e Billy Kid", "Il minotauro di Borges".
    • For a certain value of celebrity there's "Alfredo", about the real-life story of Alfredo "Alfredino" Rampi, an Italian child who made national news after falling into an artesian well but who tragically died before he could be rescued.
    • La moda del lento has a ghost track titled "Beethoven o Chopin?"
  • Cover Version:
    • They covered Billy Idol's "Eyes Without a Face" for a Gucci promotional campaign, a rare full performance in English for a band that usually only sings in Italian.
    • Bianconi has occasionally performed during concerts the song "Bruci la città", written by himself but originally recorded by singer Irene Grandi.
  • Crucified Hero Shot: At the end of "Il vangelo di Giovanni" Jesus is held like this with his arms slung over the shoulders of Claudio and another "apostle", complete with bleeding stab wound in his side and a crown of barbed wire placed on his head by Judas.
  • Downer Ending:
    • All the videos from L'amore e la violenza, as well as "Veronica, n. 2" from the following album, end with the protagonist dying ("Amanda Lear" is strangled by a jealous woman; Jesus in "Il vangelo di Giovanni" is unsurprisingly stabbed in the side by Judas; "Betty" and Veronica both commit suicide).
    • The narrator of "Contà l'inverni" ends up in prison after killing his lover.
  • Driven to Suicide:
    • The protagonist of "La guerra è finita" commits suicide by inhaling gas fumes.
    • So does "Betty" at the end of the music video, jumping from a highway bridge.
    • Same for the girl in "Veronica, n. 2" who shoots herself in the head at the end of the video.
  • Drugs Are Good: The ending of "Un romantico a Milano":
    Weed harms you if you smoke it without class.
  • Face on the Cover:
    • The only album cover on which the three members of the band appear together is I mistici dell'Occidente, among a larger group of unrelated people to purposely confuse those who aren't familiar with their faces.
    • The cover of Amen is a close-up of Rachele's eye.
  • Gratuitous German:
    • The band name, which means "construction site".
    • The ending of "Il vangelo di Giovanni" has undistinct chatter in German between a man and a woman.
  • Lyrical Cold Open: The original version of "Gomma", and "Il vangelo di Giovanni".
  • Moment of Silence: In the video for "Il vangelo di Giovanni", the music temporarily cuts off as Judas suddenly stabs the Jesus character in the side.
  • Murder Ballad: "Contà l'inverni".
  • The Noun and the Noun: L'amore e la violenza.
  • Numbered Sequels:
    • L'amore e la violenza - Vol. 2.
    • The same album contains "Veronica, n. 2". Word of God says that it's the sequel to an earlier "Veronica" song that got scrapped.
  • One-Man Song: "Sergio".
  • One-Woman Song: "Martina", "Cristina", "Betty", "Veronica, n. 2", "Perdere Giovanna" ("Losing Joan").
    • Subverted with "Maya colpisce ancora" ("Maya Strikes Again"), where "Maya" is the Sanskrit word for "illusion", other than a reference to the Maya civilisation and their apocalyptic prophecies.
  • Parental Love Song: "Ragazzina" is one, directed by Bianconi towards his young daughter.
  • Punny Name: They chose "Baustelle" — "construction site" in German — as the band name after coming across it in an Italian-German vocabulary. Bianconi stated that it caught their attention because it contains the words "stelle" ("stars" in Italian), "elle" ("her" in French) and "bau" (the Italian onomatopoeia for a dog's bark, like "woof").
  • Sampling: The first few notes of "Basso e batteria" are taken from the theme song of the 1976 TV adaptation of Sandokan, which was wildly popular in Italy.
  • Self-Deprecation: In "Veronica, n. 2":
    It's the dog who writes my songs, for better or for worse.
  • Sharp-Dressed Man: Francesco Bianconi. That's what happens when your stage suits are provided by fashion house Gucci.
  • Shout-Out: Almost every song has one or more, covering the fields of literature, philosophy, art, pop culture, history, and so on. To name just a few:
  • Sibling Team: Francesco Bianconi's brother Ettore is part of the live lineup, handling keyboards and synths.
  • The Something Song: "La canzone di Alain Delon" ("The Song of Alain Delon"); "La canzone della rivoluzione" ("The Revolution Song").
  • Two Guys and a Girl: Their core lineup of Francesco Bianconi, Claudio Brasini and Rachele Bastreghi.
  • Unexplained Accent: Bianconi sings "Contà l'inverni" in a Roman accent, despite being from Tuscany. That's because the track is inspired by an older song, "Lella", by Roman singer-songwriter Edoardo De Angelis.
  • Vocal Evolution: Both Francesco and Rachele's voices got deeper as time went by, but while his voice became bolder and less whispery, hers went more or less the opposite way. Compare the original version of "Gomma" with the 2010 remake.
  • Vocal Tag Team: Francesco Bianconi is usually the lead voice, but sometimes he duets with Rachele Bastreghi and other times Rachele has the lead for a full song.
  • Word Salad Lyrics: They lampshade their own tendency to abuse this trope in "Basso e batteria":
    She left you a child, Foster Wallace, three jumpers
    And these fucking meaningless words in the songs.

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