TTeo – Arzu

TTeo is the pseudonym of Matteo Capreoli – a half German, half Italian singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and producer with a deep musical heritage. Fernando Antonio Capreoli, his father, left Salento in southern Italy for Germany in 1970, before forming disco-funk-rock outfit Lovexpress, made up of mainly Italian and Scandinavian musicians, playing drums in the band and touring Norway, Sweden and Denmark from 1974 to 1979.

TTeo himself signed to Sonar Kollektiv in 2020, releasing the Salento EP, named after the place of his father’s birth. More recently, though, he was serendipitously handed a batch of cassettes by his dad of some of Lovexpress’ live shows from the late 1970s. TTeo was deeply impressed by the quality of the music and got his father to digitise them immediately! These recordings form the basis of, and the inspiration for, his latest LP – Lovexpress77, and are the only known recordings of the band who never quite made it into the studio to lay down an album.

The final single to be taken from Lovexpress77 is the laid back yet club friendly Arzu. It’s another track that conjures up the atmosphere of TTeo’s sultry southern Italian home, combining sprightly pianos with warm electronics and rhythmic percussion – the latter coming directly from a conga solo from his father during a live Lovexpress show. The piano was recorded on TTeo’s iPhone, capturing that moment in a very natural and simple way, as he explains, “sometimes things just happen.. It’s easy.” And in this almost effortless fashion, brings samples from today and half a century ago together – introducing his father’s original club sounds to a whole new audience.

Matteo is now back living in his family’s home town of Salento once again and sees this project as “closing a circle” both musically and personally. Although he may be opening a new one if rumours of getting the Lovexpress band back together and recording that missing studio album come to fruition! Only time will tell.