Franco Rossino - #2
Self-released
Released on August 31st, 2025
At Gwendolyn Everslack High School’s annual talent show, the air permeates a kind of kinetic energy that can be expected whenever seismic heroics and cosmic failures unfold on the gymnasium stage. Dan Alimony had just done 8 handstand pushups, and when his shirt became untucked, exposing his midriff and Fruit of the Loom briefs, the auditorium burst into such hysterical and exaggerated screaming that Principal Bertha threatened to end the event early. The chatter is still hyper and distracted as the curtains draw on the next performer, Franco Rossino, who sits slouched centre stage behind the school’s upright piano.
Franco Rossino, who’s previous album, #1, is packed with brilliantly sardonic folk-punk earworms that rail mercilessly against the day to day minutiae of small town hierarchies, garnering him a devoted club of fervent fans, most of whom now sit in the front row, giddy with excitement. With an exaggerated gesture of fancy flourish, Franco plunks the first keys, a chord progression that arcs and descends. Jamie-Lynn Garglestaff, ecstatic to hear Franco for the first time on piano, whispers to her bestie, Aloe Bonfêtemaman, “Somehow, his piano playing mirrors his voice. A sort of plunking, plodding heavy handedness that belies a deeper melodic sensibility.”
“Yeah, that’s Franco,” Aloe replies, rolling her eyes at Jamie-Lynn’s exuberance. “Plunky and melodic.”
“It’s like a mask to shield the audience from the sorrow and beauty that lies underneath,” Jamie-Lynn muses.
Franco Rossino opens his mouth and his fatigued monotone breaches the microphone, amplifying into the gymnasium. Those who know him brace for the impact of his acerbic wit, the grandiloquence in which he describes the equations of failure, his observations on lame social constructs, his indictment of all things passé and gauche, how it all rolls off his tongue in such fluid and effortless rhyme patterns.
“Something’s wrong and twisted now, the same old jokes won’t please this crowd/ it sure feels like you shouldn’t be around here.”
A smile graces the face of Jamie-Lynn; a grimace upon her friend. “Perhaps a commentary on the nature of performance and the heroic steadfastness that it takes to rise to the occasion on the stage?” Jamie-Lynn wonders aloud.
“Maybe,” Aloe replies.
“Cooking up these apparitions, trying to obscure your vision, you can see right through me every time I try to haunt you.”
“Yes I can,” Jamie-Lynn mouths to herself with a smirk.
“I had your back when you weren’t around, yeah I talked some smack but that’s allowed, we’re all living together in this small ass town.”
Aloe clenches her jaw and swallows hard, annoyed at Franco’s charm and verbal craft. “He called me fragile and derivative!” She thinks, still sore from the public vivisection.
“You’re pouring out the urge to try and fight your indignation, mopping up the floor with some self flagellation, soaking up some more til it’s seeping out the seams of your mind.”
Both friends clear their throats and remember last week’s debacle at Wild Turkey Wednesday at the Lion’s Head.
“You sure do say a lot about how I plan my day. I just don’t worry about those pesky things you say. I’ll hang my hat up if you don’t get off my case. Don’t try to scare me boss, I’ve never been afraid.”
“The steadfastness. Standing face to face with the injustice of the workplace environment. It’s incredible!” Jamie-Lynn exclaims.
“Sure,” retorts her friend, “that’s also why he can’t keep a job.”
“If the death of a child is an act of god’s will, then the hate that I face is a license to kill, and the killing won’t stop, it’s never enough, I’m addicted to killing, yeah I’m used to the stuff.”
“A fitting final indictment. Something we can all rally around,” says J-L, as she accompanies her friend down the hallway toward the front door of the school.
“His rhymes are like pillars in a building that keeps collapsing. I was wondering whether I would feature as character in any of his tragicomedy! How about you?” she asks, grabbing at Aloe’s elbow as they step out into the dreary November afternoon.
“Not really,” Aloe replies.
“Huh.”
