SUBSONICA - Terrestre

Three years after "Amorematico", which featured the irresistible "Nuova Ossessione", Subsonica carry on with "Terrestre" along the path of the crowd-rousing, somewhat politicized record, as already hinted at in the previous outing ("Gente tranquilla", "Sole silenzioso").

Some things have changed: the Turin band, once one of the jewels in the crown of Mescal, the most important independent label in Italy, has moved to Emi.

The most striking novelty of the latest Subsonica album is the return of guitars and a more traditionally rock-oriented instrumentation, at the expense of the electronics, which are still present but decidedly reined in.

Whether it's down to the recent collaboration with fellow Turin natives Linea 77, or simply the desire to give their audience a taste of wild pogo-dancing thrills, the fact remains that the new Subsonica tracks lean more and more on Max Casacci's guitar.

The opening of "Corpo a corpo", with a very aggressive rapped verse followed by an incisive, convincing bassline, seems to promise good things, but by the time we get to the bland "Vita d'altri" you already get the sense that the days of "Microchip Emozionale" are gone for good.

I'd actually already had my suspicions after hearing the dreadful single "Abitudine", but my eyes practically popped out when I got to "Gasoline", the Turin band's first (and hopefully last) song in English. A decent enough opening beat (nothing groundbreaking, mind you) gets buried under a drawn-out vocal that's meant to be catchy but comes across as fairly sad and pathetic. Five songs in, I'm already bracing for the worst.

But unexpectedly, the album picks itself back up.

The Subsonica of late-90s urban unease and troubled love affairs come roaring back on "Incantevole" (the best track here) and the following "L'odore", the only aggressive track on the album, which, helped by an excellent lyric, gives me a shot of confidence: maybe I can make it to the end after all.

But "Terrestre" is a very uneven record: after the trip-hop, motorway-cruise surge of "Alba a quattro corsie" and the excellent "Salto nel vuoto" - another track that sounds like it could have come off the band's self-titled debut - they stumble again with "Giorni a perdere": riffs lifted from the most tired-sounding Sonic Youth and worn-out hard-rock progressions.

It's also a shame about the closing acoustic lullaby "Dormi", which undoes what little good work came before it (the electronic opening of "Amantide").

Too many ups and downs, too little conviction, and a dangerous drift toward nu-metal done the Italian way: the affection I've felt for Subsonica over the years can't convince me of the merits of "Terrestre" - it lacks spark, it lacks the ideas to see things through, and the impression that too many tracks were written just to pack the crowds into concerts is simply too strong.

And somebody needs to explain to Subsonica that a song like "Tutti i miei sbagli" only gets written once.

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30/04/2026