Wilkes-Barre metalcore band Mind Power ‘Grounded’ in harsh reality in new lyric video
From a press release:
In January, Wilkes-Barre metal/hardcore band Mind Power released one of the heaviest records of 2021, aptly named “Self Torture.”
Featuring vocals from Robert Meadows, the ex-frontman of Philadelphia metalcore band A Life Once Lost, and a lineup that includes former members of Ligeia and Wilkes-Barre bands Dead End Path and Bring the Heat, “Self Torture” was originally produced as quarterly digital-only releases by the band. The 11 tracks read like a book that’s woven from those releases with a cathartic, brutally honest and, at times, self-deprecating voice.
They have been relatively quiet since the record dropped, but this past week, the band abruptly broke the silence by uploading a dark new lyric video for the track “Grounded.”
“‘Grounded’ is a song written about my poor decision-making near the end of A Life Once Lost, spanning many years of alcoholism and drug addiction,” Meadows told No Echo.
“I simply wanted a chance at obtaining peace, even if for only a second or two, with everything in my life basically falling apart and crumbling to the ground with no chance at saving myself.”
The album includes guest appearances from notable metal standouts like Norma Jean’s Cory Brandan, Darkest Hour’s John Henry and Michael Schleibaum, The Red Chord’s Mike McKenzie, and Most Precious Blood’s Rob Fusco, just to name a few.
Remastered by heavy music heavyweight Alan Douches, Mind Power’s first physical release is as heavy and earnest as the red-and-black splatter vinyl is beautiful. It is available now from Jump Start Records, a Philadelphia-based indie label that has been releasing punk, ska, hardcore, and reggae since 1996.
On its release day of Jan. 29, Decibel magazine premiered Mind Power’s music video for the song “Mess,” saying, “In the midst of a pandemic winter, dive into the depth’s of Mind Power frontman Robert Meadows’ mind on a bleak journey through darkness and snow in an almost tortured existence beyond dealing with the daily reality of COVID. Written before the pandemic, ‘Mess’ could have easily been a diatribe on the daily life we’ve all come to know all too well the past over the past year, yet here we are.”
“The song is about my battle with depression, substance abuse, living a life in which you just don’t want to exist. We all feel it,” Meadows explained to Decibel.
“Some of us talk about our problems and others bottle it up. I bottle it up and keep it to myself; it’s easier not to involve others with how I really feel. This is my life and I can choose to do what I want with it.”
In reviews and articles about “Self Torture,” Metal Trenches emphasized that it “serves as a great introduction and showcases that these guys can still hit the technical grooves and sheer anger of their past exploits while pushing towards some atmospheric and darker elements that make them feel different. … What a hell of a way to start,” while No Echo described it as “delivering a darkened ’90s hardcore sound with the labyrinthine musical arrangements of Meshuggah. It’s a dizzying sonic concoction that is channeled through the players with a fierce focus on all of the details.” Metal Injection simply said, “It’ll tear your head off.”
See NEPA Scene’s 2014 live photos of Dead End Path here and Bring the Heat here.
