(The Tragedy of) Exploding Hearts

Sometimes you discover a band years after their break up and you wonder...how did a band THIS GOOD stay under my radar for all those years?! Exploding Hearts is the latest addition in a long line of (not so fashionably) late discoveries. Their 2003 album 'Guitar Romantic' is filled with songs the Beatles could have written if they only were a punkband: perfect popsongs brought with a punk attitude and lots of distorted guitars. This is the kind of music that sounds good the first time you hear it...the kind of music which makes you go up to the dj to ask him which band he's playing, because it's so freakin' AWESOME! I've put two songs up for download...it doesn't really matter which songs I've chosen, because actually every song on Guitar Romantic would have been good. Definitely one of my favorite albums!!!
Tragedy. When I discover a band I like, I like to find out more about them. I had already read that the band broke up after their first album, so I was hoping to find the members of Exploding Hearts branched out in other bands. It was then when I found out the band actually ended and how sad this story is... On July 20th, 2003, the band returned from a show in San Fransisco, where they were offered a record deal by Lookout! Records (previous home of The Donnas and Green Day). It was early morning, when their van veered out of control an flipped over twice, supposedly because the driver fell asleep. Sadly, three out of four members (only in their early twenties) died in the accident.

Now, I know rockstars die too (they only human, right?). Some musicians even become legends by dying. If they don't kill themselves a planecrash will do the trick. There is however one big difference between the death of icons like Jimi Hendrix or Kurt Cobain and the death of Exploding Hearts. This band was only at a start of a very promising career...destined to become the next big thing. Some bands don't know when it's time to quit...Exploding hearts never even had that choice.

Dirtnap Records just announced that the label will release "'Shattered', a 16-song collection of Hearts demos, singles, unreleased material, and alternate takes from the GR sessions, in CD format" on Halloween (Oct. 31st). Watch this in memoriam below. It features their song 'I'm A Pretender'.


NOTE: you can find some articles about the accident here.

Exploding Hearts - Modern Kicks
Exploding Hearts - Throwaway style