Lost Romance

Stone cold. “Count back from three to one / Goin’ down like a setting sun / Holding back all the things you need to say,” we’re told in the opening verses of Lost Romance’s “Heart on a Wire.” There’s a chilliness to these lyrics that is met with a flashfire on the other side of the riffing in the foreground, the contrast between the two perhaps summarizing the tone of this all-new single and music video better than anything else could have. Lost Romance are everything their handle would suggest them to be in this performance, and to me, their angst-ridden take on romance is just what rock n’ roll needed this winter. 

Official Website: https://lostromance.net/

The crisp vocal here is a perfect match with the grittiness of the guitar, keeping in line with the theme of rigid juxtaposition just enough to engage even the most discriminating of alternative rock fans. By employing a stripped-down aesthetic for the music video, “Heart on a Wire” is allowed to focus on the kinship between its different aural elements even when it’s being presented to us in a visual manner. There’s something really profound about a band that is this disinterested in bombastic cosmetics in 2020, and yet Lost Romance don’t strike me as being the least bit pretentious about their craft. If hard-hitting alternative rock with a slight retro edge is your thing, New Jersey’s own Lost Romance are a crew that you can count on for good vibes this December, most of which can be sourced directly from their new single and its music video. 

"Heart on a Wire” is an incendiary little tune, but while it’s on the leaner and meaner side of the compositional spectrum, I find it to be just the right amount of intensity and artistic integrity to satisfy punks and casual rockers alike. 

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Trace Whittaker

Newcastle-upon-Tyne

12/2020