Offlaga Disco Pax
Socialismo tascabile (Prove tecniche di trasmissione)

I write this pseudo-review for all those who haven't had the opportunity and/or occasion to listen to one of the most quietly alien Italian bands, free from mainstream contamination and the commodification of their art.

Offlaga Disco Pax, natives of Cavriago, a province of Reggio Emilia, currently play a prominent role in the tumultuous indie scene of our country, thanks to their striking and inspired debut, still awaiting a follow-up. A follow-up that will hardly match the result of Socialismo Tascabile, one of the most successful albums in recent years. We were saying Cavriago. The hometown/village/district of a band that has always claimed its Emilian, lasagna-loving, and especially socialist roots, and that managed to produce an enjoyable album without letting their provincial, revisionist, and alternative attitude impair the quality of their work.

Because Socialismo Tascabile is a clear example of how one can hit the mark by narrating what nowadays seem like fables, tales of a world whose departure dates back to that autumn evening 20 years ago, when people of all backgrounds and ideologies found themselves amazed, singing, dancing, hugging, and crying over the remains of the Wall and the Cold War. Real and semi-dreamlike experiences intertwine in a journey through the Padana undergrowth between the '70s and '80s, songs of compulsory education, of freedom, of anti-consciousness/political unconsciousness, of fears and awareness, flavored with factory and protest. And how sweet it is to dive into the warm waters of amusing tales like "Kappler", where it is hard to remain impassive, in the unexpected poetic vein of "Enver", in the Loveless-like noise of "TonoMetallicoStandard". But the peak of pleasure is met in the middle of the tracklist, in the unsurpassable, surreal dialogues of "Cinnamon" and that "Robespierre", whose ophthalmic adaptation (as it is said on these pages) was voted the best of 2005.

The most appreciable quality of Offlaga is the apparent simplicity with which they induce tears and laughter within just two songs, allowing for a complex exploration of the shores of our soul. This is felt even more if, like the "writer", one is accustomed to the idea of having already heard everything, of knowing the milestones of every genre, of more or less politely rejecting novelties, often unjustly branding them as copies of copies of records already subjected to the infallible judgment of critics and the public for at least forty years.

Obviously, upon the album's release, the criticisms proved to be sparse, due to the total lack of media attention, and odiously biased, according to our criticism's beloved habit of praising or tearing down Italian bands before having appropriately evaluated them musically.

In summary, this album is recommended for those who feel nostalgia for the past, who love History, who are Emilian, for all those who desire a complete album, where harmony and noise, joy and sadness accompany each other without seeming the result of a skillful artifice.

And at a time of the Take That reunion, the fiftieth album by Iron Maiden, and Britney Spears's sexy baldness(!), it is already a feat worthy of praise.