The Daily Spin II

ALASKALASKA | Still Life

Welcome back to the Daily Spin. For the uninitiated, this is the series in which I review an album every day of 2025.

As was the case two years ago, my favorite song from each album can be found at the playlist linked here.

Album: Still Life (2022)

Artist: ALASKALASKA

Link:

In choosing today’s album, I went with a tried-and-true method - went to my megaplaylist on Spotify that has (most) everything I’ve listened to in the last ten years or so, hit shuffle, and picked an album by the first artist that came up.

There’s only one song from ALASKALASKA I was familiar with prior to this choice - that being ‘Meateater’, a indie-pop bop that grooves in low-range electronic synth, driving beats under hazy vocals that could get a stone man shuffling his feet. With that in mind, I was expecting, frankly, to see a great deal more of that kind of sound.

What I was instead treated to was a half-vision, in many ways. Don’t get me wrong - I like this project more than I expected, but a great many of the tracks here feel a little bit like unrealized concepts. It’s sort of like looking at a car show from before the recession and seeing all the models that they’re Definitely Gonna Put On The Road - enjoyable, but I do find myself wishing that there was a bit more actual meat on the bones here.

The album is solid, though. Songs like ‘Glass’ and ‘Pressure’ are great movers and groovers - I had this on while at the gym, as has become the routine, and those were the ones where it was really easy to push another set out. ALASKALASKA have a refined sense of energy about these tracks, and it’s a particular highlight, even when the instrumentals or lyrics find themselves a bit underwhelming. Though it doesn’t always work, this is a pleasant enough way to experience an hour.

Rating: 7/10

Best Tracks: Glass, Get Me High, Simple

Worst Tracks: TV Dinners