[GTranslate]SANREMO – Riff à la Led Zeppelin, very grunge groove, swear words and final provocation on Twitter: “We dedicate this victory to that teacher who always told us to be quiet and good. # Sanremo2021”.

They are precisely rolling stones, the Maneskin, winners of the 71st Sanremo Festival which will go down in history for two reasons: the absence of an audience due to Covid-19 and the triumph of rock. The true one.

The four very young musicians left behind them (with a huge advantage) the super-rated Ermal Meta and Michielin-Fedez, going against all reasonable (in a “Sanremo sense”) predictions with a song that exploded like a bomb on stage of the Ariston theater: “Silent and good”. Aggressive text in the best punk-rock tradition, a wall of sound embellished by the always wonderful Sanremo’s orchestra, stage presence worthy of the most experienced rockers.

A charge that had already emerged forcefully a few nights before, in the evening dedicated to covers, when the band presented its own version of “Amandoti” (listen to it again here: “Amandoti” Maneskin – Manuel Agnelli), a pearl of rare beauty by Italian punk-band Cccp: slow and serious introduction, as in the original, and then the “blow” in a crescendo that made their cover perhaps the best ever of those of “Amandoti” listened to in recent years or, at least, the most “faithful to the linea” of the historic band of Giovanni Lindo Ferretti. It is no coincidence that at their side, for that performance, there was Manuel Agnelli, leader of Afterhours and old lion of Italian rock, who has the merit of having discovered and launched these Roman boys in the 2017 edition of X-Factor.

Yes: guys. They are all around twenty Damiano David (vocals), Victoria De Angelis (bass), Thomas Raggi (guitar) and Ethan Torchio (drums). And their story is a rock fairy tale. Victoria and Thomas started playing together in middle school, then the band was born (the name means “Moonlight” in Danish, the bassist’s native language) and within a couple of years success came with songs like “Morirò da re”  and “Torna a casa”. A success consecrated, now, by the revolutionary, sensational victory in Sanremo. Yes, sensational because, to say it with the refrain of the song, “We are out of our minds, but different from them”.