B-Side Guys

The Transference’s “Event Horizon” is a celestial scream into the void, wrapped in the trappings of indie rock bombast. Laura Hollingsworth and her Chicago-based cohorts have crafted a track that feels like Paramore decided to score a Neil deGrasse Tyson documentary.

From its opening line, “Born in the holocene,” the song plunges listeners into an existential crisis of geological proportions. Hollingsworth’s vocals soar over a landscape of driving drums and shimmering guitars, painting a picture of humanity’s precarious place in the cosmic order. The imagery of “a hundred mirrors into space” evokes both our technological achievements and our narcissistic tendencies as a species.

The chorus hits like a meteor impact, with Hollingsworth confessing, “I’m so lonely all I see is black / I can’t feel the speed we’re moving at.” It’s a sentiment that captures both personal isolation and the vertigo-inducing reality of our planet hurtling through space. The Transference manages to make astrophysics sound downright danceable.

As the song progresses, it shifts from the deep past to an uncertain future, where we “breathe in an acid rage.” This juxtaposition of geological time scales with immediate environmental concerns gives “Event Horizon” a urgency that transcends typical pop fare. It’s as if The Transference is trying to cram the entire history of Earth into a four-minute rock song – and somehow, it works.

The track’s final plea, “I wanna see your piece of the sky / so we can find the horizon,” serves as both a romantic overture and a call for collective action. In The Transference’s hands, the search for connection becomes intertwined with the quest for planetary survival. “Event Horizon” is a reminder that even in the face of cosmic indifference, there’s solace to be found in shared human experience – and maybe, just maybe, a killer guitar riff.