Friends 23: why Holden deserved more

If you have seen the latest edition of Friends The participation of a particular competitor will certainly have caught your eye, a child of art exactly as Angelina Mango was in 2022. He is Joseph Carta, aka Holden – son of Paolo, husband of Laura Pausini -, who built a path within the school that made it clear to everyone that for him making music was more important than winning the program. Over the weeks, Holden demonstrated this on several occasions, to the point of even thinking about giving up the evening class, showing nervousness towards the professors who were only trying to direct him in the most appropriate way. The result was the growth and maturation of a talent who demonstrated great versatility towards autograph bars and musical production, but also a partially rebellious nature which was strong on television until the showdown, when the public led Holden to place third in the Singing category behind Petit and Sarah Toscanothe winner of this edition.

In hindsight, however, sorry that Holden didn't get the conclusion he deserved, arrived above all following some questionable choices as well as one of the mantras that ad Friends has been around for almost a decade now: the more or less legal use of the infamous autotune, that is, that instrument capable of improving a singer's voice in order to plug any splints and smudges. Leaving aside the fact that we don't think that autotune is really the evil of evils as some purists think, all that remains, at this point, is to wait for the real test, that is the future that awaits the boys now that the talent show is over. In fact, only time, path and choices will determine which of them will shine and fade away, and we are quite certain that Holden will try to make himself heard.

Giulia Ballone

We are certain of this because, beyond the criticisms, Holden demonstrated ad Friends not only to really understand music, but also to have an increasingly focused dedication and expertise on his side and dedicated to creating stylistically perfect works – let's think about Strays, the new single that recorded over 1.5 million audio and video streams and which will be contained in Josephthe new EP written and produced by Holden and produced by LaTarma Records, distributed by ADA/Warner Music available on May 24th -, capable of appealing to an audience eager to grasp something fresh and new. It's true, her character hasn't always been easy to manage and was probably the cause of the Critics' Award not being awarded to journalists during the final, but we've seen enough editions of Friends to affirm that all this matters up to a certain point, and that, if they are roses, they will flourish. One way or another.