Headlock Capture the Chaos of Letting Go on Post-Hardcore Gut Punch “Fallin Apart”

Breakup songs usually chase resolution. Headlock’s new single “Fallin Apart” refuses it. The Nashville alternative outfit leans straight into the mess, building a track that sits inside the emotional wreckage instead of trying to clean it up. It’s loud, vulnerable, and intentionally unfinished in spirit, mirroring the way heartbreak rarely arrives with neat conclusions.

Headlock’s sound has always thrived on contrast. With members pulling from different corners of the alternative scene, the band moves between aggression and melody with ease. “Fallin Apart” uses that dynamic range to map the emotional whiplash of losing someone you didn’t realize you’d miss this much until it was already over.

At its core, the song is about hindsight. That brutal moment when clarity shows up late and all you can do is replay the damage. The lyrics orbit regret and confusion, ruminating on what went wrong while wrestling with the reality that neither person could change enough to save the relationship. It’s not framed as a villain story. There’s no easy target. Just two people stuck in their patterns and the aftermath that follows.

What separates the track from standard breakup catharsis is its structure. The band deliberately wrote it to feel unresolved. Emotions don’t land in tidy arcs. They collide. Anger bleeds into resentment, resentment collapses into grief, and grief circles back into doubt. The arrangement mirrors that spiral. Tension builds and releases in waves, pulling the listener through the same unpacking process the band describes. It feels less like a performance and more like being dropped into a live emotional autopsy.

Vocally, the track walks a tightrope between confrontation and collapse. There’s a push-and-pull energy that keeps the song suspended in motion, never letting it settle long enough to feel safe. Guitars crash in with post-hardcore urgency, then pull back just enough to let the vulnerability breathe. That balance gives the song its sting. It hits hard without losing its humanity.

Headlock sees the track as validation, not instruction. “The main takeaway we want from this release in particular is for our audience to feel validated in their emotions despite them being conflicting, messy, or unconventional,” the band explains. “There’s no handbook for how to handle your feelings when things go wrong, so it becomes a unique journey for all of us, which is the primary point of this track.”

That philosophy sits at the center of “Fallin Apart.” It doesn’t pretend heartbreak is poetic or graceful. It presents it as it is: disorienting, contradictory, and deeply personal. By refusing to resolve the tension, Headlock creates space for listeners to sit inside their own unfinished feelings.

In a genre that often thrives on extremes, the band carves out something refreshingly honest. The song isn’t about winning a breakup or finding closure. It’s about surviving the emotional freefall and recognizing that confusion is part of the process. With “Fallin Apart,” Headlock turn vulnerability into volume and invite listeners to build community inside the noise.

You intentionally wrote "Fallin Apart" to feel unresolved. Was it scary to release a song that doesn't offer closure, knowing listeners usually expect some kind of emotional answer?

When we wrote this song, we found that a lot of the power it holds is in the fact that it meets listeners where they’re at, instead of telling them where they should go. It’s normal to want to find answers in the music you listen to, or to seek closure in a song or a story, but there wasn’t any fear involved when we decided to leave the listener hanging a little. The goal is for them to find the pieces that resonate with them and use that as a tool to continue the journey they’re on, or to simply feel validated in the fact that there’s never a right answer, and nothing is ever that easy. 

The track moves through anger, resentment, grief, and doubt in real time. When you were writing it, were you reliving a specific relationship or trying to capture heartbreak as a universal experience?

Definitely a mix of both. It started as a collection of emotions and experiences from all of us. We’re all different in the way we handle and view life, and the way we approach relationships is just that as well. What started as all of us sharing our personal experiences evolved into us realizing that, despite how differently we navigate our relationships, what we share is how complicated and messy it can become. The hardships show up in different ways, but the emotions that follow it are roughly the same. We took that as a sign that this is a universal feeling, and wanted to further validate that in the song. 

Headlock is built from members with different alternative backgrounds. How did those influences shape the emotional pacing and heaviness of this song in particular?

Our vocalist, guitarist, and drummer have a deep musical history together. They’ve worked together in previous bands before this one and have explored a lot of genres (ie. emo rap, nu metal, hyperpop) during that time. So just them alone is like having a well-oiled machine that can comfortably mesh traditional alternative sounds with more experimental ones. Our bassist, funny enough, typically doesn’t play this genre of music at all. She was classically trained most of her life and has a heavier focus on moody and melancholic alternative music. When you listen to the track, you can feel where those unique elements show up. For example, the pacing and phrasing of the song is rooted in the classical music concept that music serves as a dialogue or conversation without words. There is a push and a pull to the track, places that allow you to breathe before being met with a heavier, grittier sound. That continues to cycle throughout. This song follows a more traditionally alternative sound, but as we release more of our music, you’ll start to pick up the outside influences that sets our sound apart. 

The band talks about validating messy emotions instead of fixing them. Do you think alternative music is one of the few spaces where people are allowed to feel complicated without being judged?

Absolutely. Much of the alternative music scene is defined by the ethos of authenticity and non-conformity. We wouldn’t be authentic participants of the genre, let alone the culture if we didn’t create with the intention to reflect ourselves honestly. A huge part of being an artist is performing and putting on a show that pleases the masses. So the one place where we can truly be genuine and vulnerable is in our music. It’s important to have music that leads you to a solution or provides closure, but how will you ever get there without the music that makes you feel seen and understood in the first place? This song isn’t there to tell you what to do, just that we’re right there navigating it with you, judgment-free. And a lot of our inspirations within the genre provide the same for us.

When fans scream this song back to you live, what do you hope is happening for them in that moment: catharsis, connection, or something else entirely?

All of the above, and none of it too. We want our fans to pick and choose what parts resonate with them, whether that be all of it, some, or none. Sometimes people will really connect with the messaging and find solace in the moment when hearing it. But other times, people will just really enjoy the way it sounds without ever considering what the song actually means. Both responses to the music are welcomed and encouraged. We love and appreciate all the different perspectives this song takes on, further pushing the intention of wanting the listener to make it their own. The uniqueness of the experience our fans have when listening to this song is more meaningful than any intention or goal we would have for them. It’s our way of resonating back with our fans.