23.10.2025 at La Santeria, Milan

I wasn’t exactly planning to fall for another post-punk-spoken-word duo (F’s latest obsession, obviously), but here we are.

Big Special were loud, intense, and, against my initial skepticism, definitively super interesting. The drummer was all fire and sweat, the frontman’s voice halfway between a sermon and a breakdown and the crowd knew every single lyric. I stood there, arms crossed for the first songs, pretending to be unimpressed until I caught myself nodding along.

The sound was raw and unapologetic, nothing like the tidy “guitar-bass-drums” setup I usually love. There were heavy beats, a few pre-recorded layers and a lot of attitude and it worked beautifully. The room pulsed with energy, surprisingly it was full of adults, not just the twenty-somethings I’d expected, and by the end everyone was shouting together and had a great time. The opening act, Gans, were another noisy duo worth remembering. Overall? Not my genre, but definitely my kind of night.

AH, and in case you’re wondering: no, I couldn’t find the setlist anywhere. Typical internet.

(Above: Gans)