Swiss metalcore band Expellow have just released a new sigle with video titled “Ten Of Swords“. The song is about being trapped in a seemingly endless loop of negativity and therefore failing again and again in life. Ultimately, breaking out of the spiral succeeds by becoming aware of one’s own (controllable) part in the situation and taking back control. 

Lead singer Mik Dean stated:

The fundamental theme of the lyrics is agency, meaning having decision-making power / control over your own life, or rather over your own fate. I deliberately built an arc (a developmental arc) into the lyrics, which we also brought to life in the music video; for the spoken part “I refuse to accept my fate”, which comes once after the first verse and once right at the end, we wanted to convey two different moods; the first time, the part is more aggressive, it is a refusal, a rejection of one’s own fate, based on a certain ignorance of the “full picture”, which includes one’s own misconduct. The second rendition was meant to be deliberately calmer, more self-assured, in order to capture the development and the insight that preceded it.

From my own experience, I know that in negative phases of life one is often tempted to look for blame everywhere except in oneself; yet we often don’t realise how much this behaviour ultimately prevents us from growing and getting out of the bad situations. There is always something, even if it’s only our mindset, over which we retain control, where we can influence how things go on, and it is absolutely crucial that we don’t lose sight of that, no matter where we currently stand in our lives.

Ultimately, the song / the clip shows two ways of not accepting your fate: on the one hand, rejection through pure ignorance without the will to actually change something actively, and on the other hand, rejection combined with the will to put in the necessary work to effectively change something and move from passivity back into action.