As the world of grunge and hard rock music dissipates with time, small acts like Shutter help keep the essence of the scene alive. On August 9th, the band released “Erase Me,” the second single off of their upcoming album, Above Us All.
At the intersection between grunge and emo, Shutter utilizes youthful vocals maintaining the angst that is so prototypical to the genre’s aesthetic, paired with your staple blink-182 guitars to evoke feelings of despair in “Erase Me.”
The New Jersey band’s mission is to tap into the wide range of grunge and alternative rock influences from the ‘90s and 2000s and stop to no end to match the energy of their idols, especially evident in their latest releases. The band comprises Jonni Correa on lead vocals and lead guitar, Gavin Shields on rhythm guitar, Teresa Marinuzzi on drums, and Dawid Warchol on bass and backing vocals.
Directed by Eric Dicarlo and SquareUp Studios, the accompanying music video depicts the band playing their instruments through what initially seems like heavy rain. However, through ominous flashes to a vintage-style bathtub and a pocket knife on bathroom tiles, the rushing of the water foreshadows the fate of our lead. As we near the final third of the song’s run, the lead singer appears, sitting in the foreground as hands reach out to drag him and pick him up towards the tub. Seemingly unconscious, his bandmates proceed to drown him in the filled tub. Despite their best efforts, the singer reveals himself to be alive by the time the song ends.
The music video, while in some ways haunting, mirrors the essence of the song’s lyrics. “Erase Me” tackles one’s feelings of helplessness and being left behind or forgotten. The lines, “Let me go, erase me / Would you ever chase me down,” carry the weight of unrecognized importance the voice is experiencing. These emotions are brought to surface in the chorus: “Awful lot of issues, find yourself feeling hopeless / … eat away at the past and the present.” This feeling of helplessness reverberates through the band’s chants between lines in the chorus, alternating between, “breathe in, breath it out,” and “give in, give in now.”
Finally, as the song nears the end, the outro leaves the impression that one must let go of the memories of the person who wronged them instead of dwelling on whether they could rely on them, mirroring the lead singer’s reveal of consciousness in the video: “Help is for the hopeless / Won’t show / Forget the warmer past / Can’t hold / On to this forever / Would you even chase me down?”
“Erase Me”’s plea for help and desire to wash away the pain may be just enough to get you through the grueling experiences of young heartbreak.
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