The newest song from Moose Jaw rockers Highwind reveals that nothing comes for free in life, including love, which is seen as humankind’s most precious emotion.
“At What Cost” is the second single from the group’s latest album, Final Words, and delves deep into the intricacies of this complex emotion, shedding light on the sacrifices and struggles that often accompany it.
With a raw and powerful delivery, the track embodies the spirit of punk and brims with apathy and intensity as vocalist Chase Rysavy unleashes his tribulations onto the song. The group also invites listeners to confront the price they pay for love, exploring the highs and lows that define humankind’s most precious and tumultuous emotion.
“‘At What Cost’ is a song about being with someone (who) makes you feel alone,” the band explained. “No matter how hard you try to grasp onto them and fix things, it always seems to be wrong.”
The single fits neatly into the larger theme of Highwind’s latest EP, Final Words. Rysavy’s original idea for the project was to infuse the concept of grief being the cost of love.
That is openly on display in “At What Cost,” particularly in the track’s bridge, which drummer and unclean vocalist Troy Waggoner intensely performs: “You’re breaking my heart/My meaning is lost/If love is the prize/Then grief is the cost.”
Those who put themselves out there will be crushed, while it is inevitable that grief will follow after attaching oneself to someone or something since it will one day be taken from you, the band says. This is the cost of love.
These are the harsh realities that Highwind explores in Final Words. The band’s previous single from earlier this year, “Weighing You Down,” described the story of a hospitalized person who feels guilty for what their health is doing to their beloved partner.
Final Words is not Highwind’s first project — the band self-released Cellar Door in 2016, a full-length album they recorded live off the floor at Regina’s Blue Door Studios and that Sask. Music chose as “Best Album of 2016.”
However, the latest album was the first with lead guitarist Ehren Pfeifer. Working entirely remotely from Rysavy, Waggoner, and bassist and vocalist Eric Taylor, Pfeifer recorded all his parts in Toronto, having never played with the band before.
But the chemistry shines through, while “Weighing You Down” has become a regular on rock stations in Regina and Saskatoon, and Finals Words is gaining support from the Vancouver arts community, the band says.
It’s been a long time coming for the band, which began with Rysavy, Taylor, and Waggoner in 2014. The trio first collaborated long distance, with some time spent together on university breaks in their hometown of Moose Jaw.
Their initial self-release, “We’re All Alone,” came that year. It garnered praise from Vancouver-based magazine Permanent Rain Press, which said, “Highwind might be the best thing by far to come out of Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan … the band is capable of being more than just your average punk band.”
Now, nine years later, the band is ready to break out to the next level and make a splash in Canada’s music scene. Check out Highwind’s latest piece of art, “At What Cost,” available now on YouTube, Spotify and Bandcamp.
