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Pino Daniele Nero A Metà LP First Pressing 1980 EMI Italian Import Archival Sleeve
A beautiful recording from one Italy's best
Giuseppe Daniele (19 March 1955 – 4 January 2015), known as Pino Daniele, was an Italian singer, songwriter and musician. His influences covered a wide number of genres, including pop, blues, jazz, and Italian and Middle Eastern music.

Daniele was born to a working-class family in , his father being a harbor worker. A self-taught guitarist, he began his career as a musician playing for other successful singers of the 1970s. His debut in the Italian music world was in 1977 with the album Terra mia, which proved to be a successful mix of  tradition and Blues sounds. Daniele defined his music with the term "tarumbò", which indicated a mix of ,  and . His lyrics also attracted critical praise: written and sung in an intense , they contained strong and bitter accusations against the social injustices of Naples, as well as Italian society in general, and included melancholic personal themes. Several of the later songs are characterized by a free intermingling of English, Italian and  passages.

Daniele's talent was confirmed on the following album Pino Daniele (1979). He scored his greatest success in 1980, with Nero a metà ("Half-Black Skinned"), which was noted by some authorities as the hallmark of the rebirth of . In that year Daniele opened the  concert at the  stadium in . In 1981 Vai Mo was released. The presence of some of the most renowned musicians of the Neapolitan musical milieu, including , , and , as session men on his albums has also been widely praised.

Mario Musella was struck down by liver cirrhosis. He left behind his family, friends, and fans. For the Neapolitan music scene, it was a terrible loss. Yet, Mario was not gone. When young guitarist Pino Daniele heard about his death, he soon realized he had to pay him a tribute, and he ended up making it big. Back in those days, Daniele was working on his third studio album. A guitar virtuoso and blues enthusiast, he was attempting to mesh new rhythmic and harmonic insights with traditional Neapolitan melodies. In part because of Musella’s descent, in part because of his motown-ish sound, Daniele used to call his friend and colleague Nero a metà — half black. 

The album came out a year later, and, quite unexpectedly, it became a success. It consecrated Pino Daniele as one of the greatest talents in the country, and established his fame as a Neapolitan bluesman. But Nero a metà is not just an example of musical syncretism. An interpretation of its time, it is the voice of a whole generation.