Apocalyptic Love: Scarves – “Collapse”

Scarves

“Collapse”

Dinner Dates For The End of Days

There is something wonderfully jagged about Scarves.  Their take on love at the end of time is beautiful yet disturbing.  Scarves arefrontperson/founder Niko Stathakopoulos, Joined by Cael Watts (drums), and Nessa Grassing (guitars).  Together, they have become one of Seattle’s top math-rock, emo-punk bands, with good reason.  Scarves are not an easy listen, which is great (we have way too many ‘easy listening’ bands out there), and their subject matter is wonderful yet dark.  As their bio states:

Stathakopoulos, Grasing, and Watts wrote and rehearsed “Dinner Dates for the End of Days” under a cloud of smoke and ash from British Columbia forest fires. If “apocalyptic emo math rock” doesn’t get you excited in 2018, nothing will. Each song is a portrait of an end times that’s positively inspiring and undeniably heart-warming. Even as we lurch toward something unpleasant, it’s hard to be too bummed out with Niko’s vocals and Watts’ driving drums.

The vocals on this piece are understated and oddly, discordantly beautiful.  Scarves have released music that is the very definition of math-rock.

Here are the lyrics.  Unbelievable.

I wake up while the sun is still colluding
With the moon in a southern sky
And even the bus lines are still asleep
But I don’t mind
I like walking
Yeah, I don’t care
I like the fresh air
There’s this guy at the site
Who claims to have seen bigfoot
And all the other guys
Say he is lying
But I don’t mind
I like his stories
And besides
The demons I have seen were so much worse
So pour the concrete
Into perfect squares
This is a new foundation
She says I am looking
“A little bit lived in,
Like a building about to collapse”
But this is the sturdiest I have felt
In years — I swear!
I could be a good home
For her
So pour the concrete
Into perfect squares
This is a new foundation
Something solid
You can build upon
Two years in I sit
40 stories up
Broken bottles below — below
And a coin in my pocket
That reminds me
I got so much further to go — to go