"Buffalo is the second largest city in New York State but it's dying slowly, it's a cold gray place: rusting where the Niagara River meets Lake Erie. I've seen a lot of people watch their dreams get crushed by this city. It seems like Buffalo just gets into your blood and poisons it with cynicism and bitterness. We have a subway that goes nowhere; we have a downtown area that has nothing of substance going on... Myself, I have a serious love/hate thing with this city."- Jeremy (Dead Hearts)
As a first-year student attending the University at Buffalo, I can vouch for this quote's unfortunate veracity; this place is fucking dying. The crippling destitution of bleak, inner-city life is hardly more than a stone's throw from the privileged, beautiful campus areas of its expansive university. Abandoned factories decorate the skyline, serving as a permanent reminder of the flourishing, vivacious state that the city of Buffalo, now the fifth poorest city in America, had once enjoyed. It couldn't be any clearer that this city is on its deathbed. Dead Hearts, Buffalo's finest export in the hardcore scene (Every Time I Die is criminally overrated), have always incorporated an unflinching commentary on the state of their hometown into their lyrics, striving to find hope in the hopeless and that ever-elusive light at the end of the tunnel. Their sound, a straightforward albeit incredibly powerful and inspired blend of hardcore, punk, and raw rock and roll, is a teeth-clenching ode to broken bonds, embittered disillusionment, and the dichotomy of life in a dying city.
The slow-moving "Burning" serves as a perfect intro to the record and segue into the volatile "Bright Lights, Burnt City," one of the band's quintessential anthems: "I see this city for what it is / Nothing more than a burial ground for our caskets / Look at the skyline, look at the streets / There's nothing left but shattered dreams / Are we gonna sit around/ Or are we gonna burn it down?" The one-two punch formula also works for "Adult Crash," one of the slower, more obviously anthemic sing-alongs on No Love, No Hope, and "Goodbye," the finest track on the record. The songwriting approach (charge out of the gates as speedily as possible, get a couple choruses in, cut out everything except the muted guitar and vocals, enter the breakdown) may be formulaic, but it's also supremely effective and a surefire recipe for fantastic, fanbase-building live shows.
As the record's title and lines such as "No matter what we're taught or what we're told / In the end, we die alone" indicate, this material is a pretty far cry from posi. Dead Hearts may not give one that warm, cozy, With Honor feeling inside, but they're most definitely a welcome addition to any worthwhile hardcore collection.
