Fast Animals And Slow Kids
Alaska

THE REVIEW

Among the earliest milestones in a band's career, a crucial and challenging step at a strategic level is the choice of a name. Italian bands often can be said not to have shone for imagination and originality among various Cani, Camilla, and Clara.

The Fast Animals And Slow Kids, whose moniker is inspired by an episode of Family Guy where Peter watches a cartoon on TV showing a beast chasing an obese child, have successfully passed this stage.

If last year's “Hybris” represented the breakthrough that opened a large door, allowing them to fill all venues during their live performances and made the FASK brand profitable, now “Alaska” needed to represent a further step forward.

As often happens with subsequent albums, this “Alaska” comes across as more studied and thoughtful compared to the previous one, both in terms of arrangements and in embracing the classic song form more decisively.

Despite initial statements that spoke of a cold and dark album suitable for the autumn season, which suggested a work in the wake of Fine Before You Came or even more raw guitar work, apart from the lyrics, the cold and fog seem to have dissolved like snowmen under the sun of the following day.

Then, there are the lyrics themselves: imbued with explicit anger and discomfort smashed in your face without filters. A faithful mirror of a lost generation without points of reference or mere rhetoric, interpretations may vary greatly.
Neither those who love nor hate the very emphatic and theatrical voice of Aimone Romizi will remain indifferent.

Musically, it doesn't change too much, more presence of horns (but weren't the ones from the first album enough?), greater maturity, a couple of more reflective moments (“Overture” between post-rock and songwriting and “Il Vincente”,) a suite “Gran Final” that seems to want to step into the ring proper of Muse 2.0 and a few anthems less than the past despite the presence of “Mare Davanti” and “Coperta” to be counted among the highlights of the work.
The self-referential “Odio Suonare” is perfect for being blasted at high decibels and fed to live shows, while “Te lo prometto” revives those guitar riffs that had so captured us in pieces such as “Dove sei” and “Troia".

If “Un Pasto Al Giorno” was the all-for-one-one-for-all of the four Perugians, “Reagire Al Presente” is a sort of invitation from the band to their listeners to remember them for the future, when memories become more faded and uncertain and the first gray hairs start to grow.

Even without managing to match “Hybris” this round, Fast Animals And Slow Kids continue to make their mark, confident once again of expanding their base. Given the abilities demonstrated in the past, even more can rightfully be expected in the future.