B-Side Guys

Luke Pacuk opens with a lament for when the world was still a child, when kindness found a home in hearts before they hardened. “Death Has Found Us” traces humanity’s fall from idyllic past to blood-stained present through stark imagery and post-punk austerity. The final single from his fourth album 1983 functions as both accusation and reminder, contrasting the slowness of days that once drifted with the current rush to fill empty hands with nothing that matters.

The Poland-born, Southampton-based artist approaches the material with gothic darkness that never feels performative. The production strips away ornamentation, letting the bleakness of the message sit unadorned. Pacuk’s vocals carry the weight of someone who’s spent time considering mortality seriously—not as abstract concept but as the inseparable companion of existence. His work as session musician, producer, and multi-instrumentalist informs the arrangement’s economy; every element serves the central thesis without distraction.

The lyrics document transformation from benevolence to greed, from community to isolation. When Pacuk sings about tears washing away sin in the past tense, he’s establishing what’s been lost—a time when pain could be soothed and redemption was possible. The present offers no such comfort. Now the world’s a stone, tears have run dry, and you stand alone beneath empty sky. The chorus hits with brutal directness: death has found us, life has turned to dust. No metaphorical cushioning, just the fact stated plainly.

What gives the track its particular urgency is Pacuk’s bridge into broader philosophical territory. He’s asking listeners to remember death not morbidly but practically—as motivation to slow down, give time to loved ones, create something lasting beyond our brief existence. The blood-stained shirt and arrogance he describes aren’t personal attacks but observations about collective trajectory, humanity running on autopilot toward destruction while reckoning the world belongs to them.

For an artist who doesn’t focus on single genres, Pacuk has found the right sonic framework for this message. The post-punk and dark wave influences provide the appropriate bleakness without melodrama, creating space for uncomfortable truths about how we’ve traded kindness for greed, connection for isolation. “Death Has Found Us” doesn’t offer solutions because Pacuk seems to understand that recognition must come first—acknowledging what we’ve become before we can consider what we might reclaim.