Shelf Lives start “Off The Rails” with a repetition of the line, “No fuckin’ way man” as the song careens into a glitchy, driving song that captures the headiness of the hypnosis in being caught up in a cycle of consumerism. Succinctly, Shelf Lives with the touches of distortion on the lead vocals and the frantic pace of the song and its urgent electronic melodies incisively outlines how consumerism can tap into basic human psychology and induce compulsive behaviors and manipulate the mind’s reward and punishment system at a basic level that’s provided and marketed to us as little things that we can buy as a seeming shortcut to fulfillment when it just isn’t. The chorus of “Can’t go off the rails now ’cause you’re none in a million” encapsulates how consumerism both controls and depersonalizes in equal measure with the corrosive nature of its inherent appeal as a tool of capitalism in a social and economic system that reinforces compliance on a nearly instinctive level. Shelf Lives in creatively delineating the dynamic point to how we can deprogram ourselves in first breaking the cycle of manufactured desire. Listen to “Off The Rails” by electro post-punk band Shelf Lives on Spotify and follow the group at the links below.
Queen City Sounds and Art 
You must be logged in to post a comment.