Before the Romans, there were the Etruscans, a mysterious but sophisticated civilization that deeply influenced the ones that succeeded it.

Tarquinia, on the west coast of Italy, was an ancient Etruscan city, and it’s where Marco Contestabile grew up, surrounded by history, myths and even an Etruscan necropolis.

As part of our Sense of Place: Rome series, Contestabile performs as his one-man blues project, Black Snake Moan. In this session recorded live at Rome’s Studio 33, he’ll talk about how his hometown influences his mystical, psychedelic music, and he’ll get into the parallels between Tarquinia and the American Southwest, a place that he’s long been drawn to.

This episode of World Cafe was produced and edited by Kimberly Junod. The web story was created by Miguel Perez. Our engineer is Chris Williams. Our programming and booking coordinator is Chelsea Johnson and our line producer is Will Loftus.