After more than ten years of silence, Modern Life Is War return with Life On The Moon. A title that promises orbits and revolutions, but the impact feels more like a neon-lit parking lot, melancholic like those summer nights when nothing really happens.
To understand this comeback you need to look back. Hardcore was born in the early 1980s between New York and Washington, spreading to Boston, LA and San Francisco, becoming a refuge for kids who rejected the dominant models. In Washington, Ian MacKaye with Minor Threat launched Straight Edge; in New York the CBGB matinees were the secular church of an entire generation, while in California, between Black Flag and Circle Jerks, the music often degenerated into fights and gangs. In the 2000s, Modern Life Is War picked up that legacy, trying to channel it into something more introspective and less tied to the myth of violence.
Life On The Moon tries to reconnect with that tradition, but never fully recaptures the spark. First Song On The Moon blends rage and melody but leaves above all a nostalgic aftertaste; There Is A Telephone That Never Stops Ringing works better, its tension building to an explosion, though the shadow of The Stooges looms as an inevitable comparison. Johnny Gone, the comeback single, bursts with energy but remains stuck in its own mannerisms.
In the end it’s a record that alternates sincerity and fatigue, without ever finding true balance. Not a disaster, but not a memorable return either: more than a manifesto, it feels like running into an old high-school friend. You’re glad to see him, sure, but after a few minutes you realize you don’t have much left to say.