Il ballo della vita

Like in the previous EP Chosen, Il ballo della vita is a modern Italian pop rock record with influences from funk, reggae and ska.^[1][2][3] In an The Upcoming interview, the band cited Led Zeppelin, Arctic Monkeys, Harry Styles, Red Hot Chili Peppers and Bruno Mars as inspirations for the album.^[4]

The album's title is meaning a "celebration of youth, of freedom".^[5] The central figure of the album's lyrics is the fictional muse "Marlena", a "woman who represents beauty and the message we want to communicate: a message of freedom of choice, of attitude, of style to which we have tried to give a face, a name and a voice".^[5] Another protagonist is a man who wants to be with her until the very end. According to frontman Damiano David, she is also a "personification of the fear of not being able to be oneself. Man is security, believing in oneself, like a father or an older brother, and he takes this woman into an objectively uncomfortable situation to bring her to a better version: not changing her, but making her accept herself, her aspirations".^[6]

Five out of twelve songs in the album contain lyrics in English: "New Song", "Sh*t Blvd", single "Fear for Nobody", "Are You Ready?" and "Close to the Top".

In October 2018, the band released This Is Måneskin, a documentary film which delved into the band's career beginnings, personal life and the creative process of producing the album.^[7]

The album was promoted by their first career tour which was held between 2018 and 2019, and which had sold-out over 70 dates with more than 140,000 tickets, including their first European tour with eleven sold-out dates in Spain, France, Switzerland, Germany, Belgium and the United Kingdom.^[8][9][10]

By May 2019, the tracks accumulated more than 196 million streams on Spotify.^[11] Following the band's win at the Eurovision Song Contest 2021 with the song "Zitti e buoni" (from their succeeding album Teatro d'ira: Vol. I), the album entered charts outside Italy (and Switzerland) for the first time.

All tracks are written by Damiano David, with track #7 co-written by Matteo Privitera and composed by Luigi Florio.^[12]

Credits are adapted from the album's liner notes.^[12]

Group

• Damiano David – vocals
• Victoria De Angelis – bass
• Thomas Raggi – guitars, acoustic guitar, resonator guitar
• Ethan Torchio – drums, percussion, drum machine

Additional musicians

• Fabrizio Ferraguzzo – arrangement, orchestration, synth, synthesizer (Juno), drum machine, lap steel guitar
• Enrico Brun – orchestration, synth, electric organ (Organo Hammond), synthesizer (Moog), mellotron, synthesizer (Juno), fortepiano, keyboards (Solina, Farfisa)
• Riccardo Jeeba Gibertini – trumpet, flugelhorn, trombone
• Marco Zaghi – tenor saxophone, baritone saxophone, flute
• Andrea Di Cesare – violin, viola
• Mattia Boschi – violoncello

Production and design

• Måneskin – production, arrangement
• Fabrizio Ferraguzzo – production, engineering, mastering
• Riccardo Damian – recording
• Enrico La Falce – engineering, mastering
• Corrado Grilli - graphic design
• Paolo Sant'Ambrogio - photography