Off The Mountain – ‘Back In Time (For A Moment)’ (2019)
I’ll be honest, I’m not a fan of indie music. It’s rare that I will willingly put my headphones on and deafen myself with an indie band. Those indie bands that make it my playlist are extremely lucky because they’re sitting between pop-punk, alternative rock, some opera and, I’ll admit, 90s boy bands. Backstreet will always be back. So, when a friend sent through a new single from one of his other musical projects, I was intrigued. He’s good at what he does in his alt-rock band, so what else does he have up his sleeve?
Off The Mountain was formed in 2017 as a Dallas-based collaboration between Brendan Winters (guitar), Ben Koch (bass), Michael Machart (drums), and Dan Hassell (vocals). Since the formation, the band has been building a fanbase in the area, but at the end of 2018, they eventually felt it was time to hit the recording studio and release material. ‘Back In Time (For A Moment)’ is the band’s debut single, and was released on all music streaming platforms on February 16th.
From the opening keys to the powerful guitar and unique vocals, ‘Back In Time (For A Moment)’ is one of the more captivating tracks I have heard this year. Now, I misinterpret songs all the time – it’s the curse of over-analysing lyrics from a psychologist’s perspective. In most cases, things are always depressing and someone broke up with another person to find themselves in such a loathsome situation where they use music as a catharsis. The best lyric, for me, was the most prominent one where a request is made to take him back in time and prove that moment was more than a good thing. If only we could all do that with happy moments. Winters stated that the aim was to create a fun song for people to sing their car, so should I leave it at that?
I have to mention the single cover. I think my heart was stolen by the adorable image of Dan Hassell as a young ‘un singing into a toy microphone by his Christmas tree. Since he grew up to have a such a soothing voice, I’m pretty sure that moment was more than a good thing.
What’s my recommendation?
Like I said, I’m not into indie bands, but Off The Mountain will be one of the rare artists to find their place between My Chemical Romance, Waterparks and a ton of other non-indie groups in my playlist.
To engage with Off The Mountain, check out their Facebook. You can also stream the single on Spotify or Deezer.
