SOUND & FURY

I AM BEING PROBED. “NO, NOT A CHANCE. ARE YOU REVVING IT TOO MUCH?” “I DON’T THINK S0…”

I mutter vaguely, failing to mention that I’m actually holding the car some 1,000rpm under the level it should be.

“You’ll have to take it out of Track mode then. It’s way too loud…”

“Ah. Uh. Yes. I shall do that!” I exclaim brightly, fiddling theatrically with a large toggle on the dash and lifting off the throttle. “That will be fine then – thanks!”

I drive away, leaving a confused looking marshall swatting his noise-o-meter at empty air. The Mustang wasn’t in Track mode. It was in the quietest setting I could find, and it still failed the noise test so spectacularly everyone thought the exhaust had fallen off.

This, it seems, is par for the course at this point, because you’re looking at the death of subtlety. A citrus green Ford Mustang GT500 and a dark green Alfa Romeo Giulia GTAm. Both the snowy peaks of their respective ranges, amped up, superhero incarnations of cars that also come with much poorer relations in their respective family trees. Both are noisy, inefficient and a bit silly. Both are therefore, according to my frothing inner child, utterly brilliant. This is overkill done two ways – European precision vs American clout.

The Mustang is immediately the more attention grabbing, simply because it is possibly the loudest roadgoing car I have ever tested. The four tailpipes are big