At the Heart of it

you couldn't stay

Available Now via Wide Eyed Noise

Dubbed what the band called an "urgent release," At the Heart of it's latest release you couldn't stay delivers a strong and powerful message.

The EP starts with 'Currents' - a song full of emotion and pain. "We watched your innocence slowly slip away, swallowed by the sea," frontman Richie Downs sings. "Taken from us well before your time. Ripped from your friends, your family and your life." Holy shit that's some serious stuff. The song continues down that path by later asking, "Are we all just swept away? Without a face? Without a name? Never feeling safe in your own skin." A song full of raw emotion is only amplified when seen live. With Richie covering the entire floorspace to guitarists jumping off amps, ATHOI not only delivers a powerful message in their song but a powerful performance as well.

The second and final track, 'Sunspots,' is just as good as the first. Written about a lost loved one the song plays out as a letter to someone who is no longer with us. "I heard you say that nothing lasts forever but the memories we've made along the way, but I can still see your face. As clear and ever present as the moment that they took you away," Richie sings. " tried to tell myself that it was just your time. I tried to focus on your life, but it's your absence that defines who I've become now." By far my favorite song on the EP, 'Sunspots' is so full of pain and emotion and is a song anyone who has lost a loved one can relate to. "I believe that a piece of you lives on in every piece of me. You're never truly gone as long as we continue to breathe," are two lines that show us loved ones are truly never gone. The pain of losing a loved one never goes away, we merely learn, however tough, to live without them. ATHOI delivers this message perfectly.

With so much emotion packed into two tracks you couldn't stay is an album you're going to want to have on repeat. Listen to the album on their bandcamp here.