"The Endings" by Blindside, Sunday, November 28, 2021

In 2002, when Blindside released their major-label debut, Silence, there was a lot of hype around this group. Formed in Sweden as Underfree in 1994, the band released two records in the United States through Solid State Records, Tooth & Nail's hard music sister-label. The band was heavily promoted by fellow rock bands, especially P.O.D., whose multi-platinum 2001 record Satellite solidified the hard rockers in pop culture. As P.O.D. had been helped by other bands in the scene, the group paid it forward with other bands, particularly Blindside. Blindside toured with P.O.D.; their lead singer, Christian Lindskog, appeared on the track "Anything Right" on Satellite; and the band even appeared in P.O.D.'s music video for "Boom." In the video, Blindside appears as "Sweden" in the outrageous pingpong tournament. 

WHAT IF I COULD REACH INSIDE? Silence was a rebirth in Blindside's sound. Elements of the hardcore sound on the band's first two albums can be heard throughout the album. However, the band started incorporating melodies. Satellite's producer, Howard Benson, brings out instrumentals that sounded otherwise crunchy and muddled on the first two Blindside records. However, tracks like "Sleepwalking" and the band's biggest single "Pitiful" feature Christian's sometimes grotesque growling scream. Besides P.O.D., the band toured with Hoobastank, Papa Roach, and Linkin Park, as well as appearing on the Ozzfest line-up. The music video for "Pitiful" appeared on MTV2 and Fuse, and was a radio rock single. The band performed the song on Conan O'Brian and in the movie Grind at a skateboarding event. The band's follow-up single "Sleepwalking" was not as big as "Pitiful." The screaming perhaps made the song less marketable to rock radio. The band's mainstream appeal carried over into their follow up, About a Burning Fire, with the video for "All of Us" appearing on Fuse, but after that record, the band left their label to release music independently. They haven't had a U.S. mainstream rock hit since then. 

THE ENDINGS ARE ALL GOOD? Silence is a moody album and a well-produced effort. As the band had come from chaotic hardcore roots, Silence can be accurately called a post-hardcore records and Blindside a post-hardcore band. The hard elements are still present in Blindside's music, but those elements became calculated to give the most effect. "The Endings" isn't one of the best tracks on the record, but it does show the Blindside sound--Lindskog moving seamlessly between singing and screaming. I wasn't very familiar with Blindside's songs on Silence other than their hits "Pitiful" and "Sleepwalking." Heavy music used to scare me a bit because of the fear that it was satanic. The first heavy record I bought was P.O.D.'s Satellite and skipped the songs that were mostly screaming. "Sleepwalking" may have been one of the first screaming songs I liked along with P.O.D.'s "Set It Off." "Sleepwalking" had to grow on me, but I worried that the rest of the band's album would be harder than "Sleepwalking." By 2004, I overcame the fear of satanic hard rock. Skillet's Alien Youth and Collide were arguably heavier than Satellite, and there was something so satisfying about music with screaming in it. So I bought Blindside's About a Burning Fire and listened to it a lot. These days, music with screaming isn't as satisfying as it was back in the early '00s, but the day-and-age of streaming services allows me to relive my childhood through the albums that shaped it. So, while "The Endings" isn't the best Blindside song nor is it a song I often think of when I remember the band, hearing it today took me back to my living room, when I would watch TVU while my mom was out, not to annoy her with the heavy music. Or worse, get a lecture about how evil that music was.

Read “The Endings” by Blindside on Genius.