Hot on the heels of their first-ever No. 1 hit on radio (“Monster”), All Time Low drop the equally-ferocious follow-up called “Once in a Lifetime.” In true ATL fashion, reconnecting with go-to collaborators Zakk Cervini (Blink-182, Machine Gun Kelly) and Andrew Goldstein (Katy Perry, blackbear), the new cut crashes the senses in bursts of color and sound.
Videos by American Songwriter
Once in a lifetime, never the right time / Take it fast and kill me slow / Trying to forget you, gotta pretend to, sings frontman Alex Gaskarth. The melody’s volatility dances against wily production, shattering any previous sensations of pain and heartache.
The song explicitly confronts “loss and dealing with loss, facing harsh realities and coming out the other side stronger for it,” Gaskarth says in a press statement. “We wrote this song in bleaker times, in a world still asleep at the wheel that left us all relearning how to navigate the uncertain roads ahead, but ultimately there is a hopeful undertone to the entire sentiment. Things can only be so bad and once it’s over, it’s over; there’s room to start rebuilding.”
He adds, “This song feels like it’s cut from the same cloth as ‘Monsters’: a progression and continued evolution from the celebration” as found on the band’s 2020 record Wake Up, Sunshine.
In the accompanying visual, directed by Max Moore (New Found Glory, Travis Barker), the group retraces a former relationship, the imagery falling like faded and worn memories. Meanwhile, performance footage is pieced together to accentuate the present, as they continue picking up the emotional pieces and glueing them back together.
Last week, the band took to The Ellen DeGeneres Show to perform “Monster,” a collaboration with blackbear, which also saw a duet version with Demi Lovato.
Upon its release, Wake Up, Sunshine bowed atop Billboard’s Top Rock Albums Chart. “I had a year of just being more sad than usual and it wasn’t for any particular reason,” Gaskarth told American Songwriter last spring of the album. “It was just an odd time in my life when I just felt like things were missing, but nothing really was. I felt empty and went into a darker space. This record really felt like the healing process for me.”
Watch the “Once in a Lifetime” video below.
Photo by Nolan Knight
