The Venerus Rhapsody

Venerus, Italian singer-songwriter, record producer and multi-instrumentalist; we would describe you as a melomaniac, a true connoisseur of music.
Who is actually Venerus?

V: Erm…I don’t know, mainly a songwriter and a musician. Yeah, let’s say I’m touring now and being on the road makes me realize that in the end the main thing I do is singing and writing; however the reason why people come to concerts I reckon is mostly that I sing my own songs; so then everything else is kind of on the back burner.

“Il Segreto” is a record that stands in contrast with today’s times, where often the status of the artist takes precedence over his art itself; what did you want to communicate with this album and what was the most exciting part of its creation process?

V: I think it’s a record that makes our vision clear. I’m speaking in the plural because anyway it’s not a work I made by myself, and therefore it is representative of a collection of people working around my project: what comes out is how we see music and how we conceive of it, at least as far as the songs are concerned, which is something very handcrafted, “created by people”, that very much emphasizes our humanity and our way of making music which is playing instruments; that I think is kind of the hidden theme, obviously the record is not about that but as an experience of the record, it is indeed about that.

Maybe the most exciting part was recording it, since it was all created in a very condensed moment, just in a handful of days…and it was a bit of seeing a mental project take shape.
I read that it was recorded in a “single-take”, in a home studio with your working group.
Yes, we wanted to try it this way: nowadays everything is turning into something plastic and you can’t tell where people are. Well, we wanted to do the opposite, bringing OURSELVES into people’s ears.

Your projects frequently revolve around the “love” and “sharing” duo. For Venerus, what significance does “sharing” hold? And how much the course should change in today’s world, so that “sharing” could regain its pivotal role?

V: This philosophy is something that – for me – comes to life in live performances. Since I started releasing music I never stopped playing live.
Even if no new music was being released I always went on tour, precisely because for me sharing means meeting people.
The moment an artist puts out music and people listen to it, a bond is created, but that bond actually becomes concrete the moment you go out there, make live music and meet people. You have to try to always bring something new, something alive, something concrete, and that is the most interesting part of my job, “sharing with people what I absolutely believe about music “. Over the years I realize that by dint of playing around we have brought a lot of people together by encapsulating it under this concept of “sharing.”

In 2023, the number of feminicides exceeded 100 victims in Italy. It is implausible to remain defenseless in the face of this. In the song “Il tuo cane” there is a message that approaches the submission of a man to a woman he loves. These theme is opposed to, let’s say, lyrics from genres such as rap/trap where instead, at times, the woman is portrayed as a body/instrument related to sexuality, in part fostering a toxic culture settlement of patriarchy in younger people, as well as those who listen to the genre. From your point of view: should we start by changing the lyrics and try to convey a different message?

V: Well, changing the lyrics is certainly not enough. As you also said rap, as much as it is the most listened to genre, has a target audience that sees a very high percentage of teenagers. In my opinion one of the main problems is that we live in a society where you don’t get educated on certain issues and at the same time, with social media, everyone has a voice.

We are facing a fairly “dark” phase of society but this should not make us think that it is “the end.”

If I think about the historical moments of humanity we have often had both positive and negative peaks, and a negative period is generally followed by one of recovery; I like to think that this is the direction in which we are going.

The refrain of “Fantasia”, the closing track on your album, begins with “I built my  castle above the clouds, now I don’t want to open my eyes, I  don’t want to  stop….”. In this dreamlike journey, that can be an album as much as life itself, do you think that building our own castle above the clouds can be a solution to be less influenced by societal dynamics and thus be able to have more arbitrariness over our own choices?

V: Well, I certainly do. To me, society is a scary place, and I kind of don’t want to be part of it. I also reckon that I don’t want to go crazy and become a madman who has lost his mind completely, however I need to build my own universe within this one, with points of contact but with the firm need to not feel influenced by what happens outside, as much as I can. That doesn’t mean being unaware of the world and of what’s going on around us but it does mean being able to choose not to be dependent on each of these things, which in my opinion, as an artist, is fundamental….

I then have always been a rebel, ever since I was a kid; I didn’t feel like doing the things they told me to do, I didn’t feel like living the way they said. In many ways, I see myself as a pirate. Especially during tours, it feels like I’m on my own special vessel with my friends, who are embarked on a mission with me. Yes, we navigate the same seas as everyone else, but I believe it is vital we try carve out a distinct and personal little world of our own.