Florence’s very own tastemaker Ricardo Baez brings you the spectacular album Tutto Passa, his first album release on Live At Robert Johnson (LARJ) out on 14th February 2025 digitally and streaming, plus as a ten track album and on vinyl as a special five-track of floor fillers.
Ricardo Baez has always been immersed in music, from his Italian father's extensive collection of old blues and jazz records, to the 80’s pop cassettes his Venezuelan mother used as the soundtrack for her dance classes. After many groundbreaking releases across the most prestigious labels in electronic music, including his own label Tropical Animals, LARJ is a label match made in heaven for the Florentine.
The lucky few that have heard Tutto Passa (Everything Passes) so far, already recognize it as Baez’s pièce de resistance, every track filled with meaning, an anthology of the most important moments in Baez’s life.
An avid manga fan, the opening track Hi No Tori 2772 is based upon a 1980’s comic Baez read as a child. Birdsong glitches against an intimidating machine synth background, signifying the moment of change from natural to technological revolution. Piccolo Incerto Futuro (Little Uncertain Future) is a three-chord-lament with a driving bassline and optimistic synth butterflies fluttering overhead. It tells of the juxtaposition of sadness and hope for the future felt by Ricardo Baez leaving his small hometown in the Mezzogiorno, to move to Florence when he was eleven years old.
From here, Baez turns to the spiritual, less chronological but equally important. Tears Of Joy perfectly encapsulates that feeling where you are so happy you want to cry. Inside of Me represents the realisation that we need to be kind to ourselves. Soothing choral voices singing over a sinister riff, telling us to acknowledge our mistakes and moving forward. This leads perfectly into My Thursday Night: The bundle of elastic bands inside Baez’s tummy before every Tropical Animals party.
The next three tracks are dedicated to Baez’s mother and his Venezuelan heritage, as she whispered to him “Don’t worry my dear, Tutto Passa (Everything passes)”. The beautiful Arroz Con Leche (Rice Pudding) is based upon the first nursery rhyme he remembers and La Isla Margarita, the tropical paradise she talked of, of which Baez has only seen in dreams.
The penultimate tracks are tracks of love, first You Stole My Heart, about his adopted hometown of Florence and A Song 2 Say, I Love You, which he describes as “The most sincere and innocent declaration of love I’ve ever made.”
The final track, Johannes Albert’s remix of La Isla Margarita brings a resounding finish to the album. Ricardo Baez explains: “Johannes’ remix adds that extra touch to make the track fully dancefloor ready. An acid pad and the increased BPM take the track to another level of interpretation, while the more pronounced basslines make it incredibly catchy!”
On some albums, its best for the listener to find meaning themselves. On this incredibly diverse album, knowing Ricardo Baez’s intentions deepen and open each and every track up, so much so, that you’ll feel like you know Baez as a friend, his boundless energy, sincerity and enthusiasm shining through.
Buy link: https://lnk.to/TuttoPassa
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