Band: Lifelike
From: Prague, Czechia
Their formation story:
"I remember desperately looking for someone to start a '90s hardcore-influenced straight edge band in Prague since a band I played in, Daydream, broke up in 2013. The basic idea for what turned into Lifelike came up at one of the local shows with me asking Ivan I was in a Youth Crew band called Makepeace with, if he was up for starting something new with Aleš, the drummer of Exude and one of the 2 straight edge drummers in the area.
"We started jamming together during the pandemic and when we had like 2 or 3 songs, we asked our friend Madhu from Santiago de Chile, to see us at the rehearsal room and try something together. Things worked out great so we carried on as a 4-piece until 2024, when Kuba from Scoop finally joined us.
"We all come from different backgrounds and we all experienced different things in our lives, some of us are even generations apart from eachother, but we all share this passion for hardcore that is rather difficult to describe in words. "
Their sound in their own words:
"I would say that we were about to do a New Age Records type of band, obviously having bands like Outspoken, Undertow, Strife, or Strain in mind. The kind of hardcore I personally grew up with in the '90s.
"The 5 of us obviously have rather different influences in terms of hardcore and punk music, but if I was gonna name 5 bands we all agreed on as the main influences on what we're doing with Lifelike, I would probably go with Outspoken, Earth Crisis, Strife, 108, One King Down and Ecostrike, to name at least one of the recent bands."
Latest release info:
"We recorded 4 songs with our friend Amak at Golden Hive Studio, then our friend Charles Chaussinand, who helped us a lot with recording and mixing our demo, added some extra guitars and Connor McAulife mixed and mastered it all.
Our friends at Youth2Youth Records and Passion Means Struggle worked together to make this 7" happen and we're happy to become labelmates with some kickass bands, such as Protein, Distante, Care, Gear, Foresight, Alive Inside to name a few.
"Doing things this way just felt pretty natural, as we've been friends with people running these DIY labels way before Lifelike even started."
Future plans:
"I can only say I wish I was in this band 15 years ago. We would tour all the time and wouldn't give a shit. Nowadays it's not that easy anymore as life gets in the way. I have 2 little daughters, some of us have dogs, we all have full time jobs, Kuba is in 2 other active bands.
"Lifelike is gonna do a short European tour with London-based straight edge band called Supernova in May. Make sure you check them out. Not saying this because Lifelike is gonna tour with them, but seeing them live recently reminded me of how much I still love hardcore. And it's not just because they make great Ten Yard Fight rip-off shirt, but because they're amazing, have tons of positive energy on stage and the message that matters on top. Unfortunately kind of rare mix to see nowadays.
"Other than that, we got invited to play Protein's last show in September, really excited to share the stage with our good friends and a band that had a huge impact on the east-euro straight edge scene of the last decade for one last time. We work on new songs that we plan to record and release when these are finished, even though this is a rather slow process for us.
"We have some other plans for other tours, that also incude our friend Ilja ready to fill-in on guitar, whenever I have to stay home with the family or Kuba is away with one of his other bands."
What other bands from their region should we check out?
"Speaking of bands in our area we like, are friends with and like to share shows with, those would definitely be Empty Hall of Fame, Protijed, Pulse, Hever, Boost, Hyacinth, Scoop, Bitter Season, Sober Sight.
"As for the bands we're close to that are almost in our area, as we couldn't care less about the countries and borders, we love Escalate, Remain, Gear and of course, all the bands our Youth 2 Youth buddies put out."
Lifelike on social media: Instagram
Tagged: lifelike
