Backtrack – Lost in Life

Backtrack
Lost In Life
Bridge Nine Records
★★★★

I miss East Coast Hardcore at the height of the East Coast Hardcore scene. Gorilla Biscuits, Agnostic Front, Murphy’s Law, it was a good time to be in the punk/hardcore scene. Coming from a Midwest background, to discover these New York bands was like spinning an entirely new perspective to life on this planet. The music had such a close connection with the people, even digging into albums and videos made us feel closer even though we were far away.

That community lives on through Backtrack. Long Island’s answer to classic hardcore in the somewhat new millennia. We have seen bands come and go with others (Sick Of It All and Agnostic Front come to mind) weather time. A follow up to Darker Half, Lost In Life is everything you now come to expect from this band yet more powerful than ever before.

All of these songs beg a sense of immortality to their fury and immediacy in tone. It makes a song like “Their Rules” feel even more potent. How dare they?!? Backtrack taunts, we agree. Damn the man!

Backtrack – Darker Half Live

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EiwzgxC5UmU

Lost in Life not only builds a sense of individuality, something essential to any punk band’s conduct, but it also teaches us humanity through these songs. “Tortured,” “Still Searching,” “Guilty Conscience;” these songs do not pack a punch like A Perfect Murder, who is a band that taps into the same vein as Backtrack. Where Backtrack relates is these immensely personal power plays that lyrically where their hearts on their sleeves. Where they differ is that Backtrack does not maintain a steam train philosophy of absolute immediacy, something that can blur the lines. For this band, they want the message to be as clear as we can make it.

“Rules On Your Race” is so fist-pounding hard it’s hard not to throw stuff out of the way and make your own mosh pit no matter what the geographical location may be. Backtrack shows just how far they have come as musicians yet how little the concept of liberty and society have come. A sad but all too realistic scenario. “Right This Wrong” is that call to arms for change and for a better world and for a better self as the band tends to reference often.

Like the forefathers of punk, Backtrack continues the honored tradition of fighting the good fight. Lost In LIfe is some of the more amazing collection of hardcore songs you have heard in a long time.