At first glance, when I saw the artwork of “Stay Angry! Stay Foolish!”, I admit I was intrigued. I put on my headphones and listened to a few tracks, but unfortunately, my enthusiasm plummeted rapidly due to several aspects.
The first: does melodic hardcore in 2012 still make sense? In my opinion (entirely personal, to be clear), it does not. And apparently, I’m not the only one who thinks so, given that labels that made even the walls talk in the '90s, like Fat Wreck Chords and Burning Heart, have slowly given way to new trends made in the USA.
The second: what drives an underground band to engage with this type of music? A difficult question to answer, so let's chalk it up to passion, which fundamentally never lacks in musicians. Summarizing these two points, you will be quite clear about what Foolish Wives are dealing with, a Friulian band that shows strengths and weaknesses equally noticeable. On one hand, our guys' willingness to take on the world, with the enthusiasm of those who have the right hunger to emerge; on the other, a genre that certainly does not help and a sense of repetitiveness that looms after just a few tracks. Upbeat rhythms, easy-to-understand lyrics, and that live attitude that helps them not fall too much into the mundane. A ballad that breaks, if nothing else, the album's pace, almost ends up being the best track among the lot.
A school project, neither praiseworthy nor disgraceful, which might appeal to enthusiasts but has little to offer to those who dealt with melodic hardcore years ago.
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