[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/hanl.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:350:L-R: Tim Macuga and Dan Barrett]]

--> ''This is [[TitleDrop Deathconsciousness]]-''
--> ''And It begs the question - [[ArmorPiercingQuestion "What is the point?"]]''
--> - The prologue of the ''Deathconsciousness'' booklet.

Have a Nice Life is an experimental rock band from Connecticut. Consisting of Dan Barrett and Tim Macuga, the band is known for their unique style mixing elements of {{shoegaze}}, PostPunk, PostRock, and drone, as well as the bleak, funereal atmosphere of their music. The band was founded in 2000, but didn't release their first record until 2008, when they came out with the double album ''Deathconsciousness''. Though it was released to little attention at first, the album gradually picked up a devoted cult following on the internet. After this they went into another period of hiatus, releasing a couple collections of demos as well as an EP called ''Time of Land''. In 2014 they released their second full length album, ''The Unnatural World'', to widespread praise.

!! Discography:
* ''Music/{{Deathconsciousness}}'' (2008)
* ''Voids'' (2010, demo)
* ''Time of Land'' (2010, EP)
* ''Live at the Stone NYC'' (2010)
* ''Voids II'' (2014, demo)
* ''The Unnatural World'' (2014)
* ''Sea of Worry'' (2019)
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!!We kill everyone with tropes, tropes, tropes, tropes, tropes....:
* ArcSymbol: Arrowheads, which appear twice in "Bloodhail" with the lyric repetition of "Arrowheads" and "Hunter", which focuses on Humanity killing God by sending a "Great Hunter" to shoot him with his arrow.
* AlbumIntroTrack: Despite being one of the longer songs on the album, "A Quick One Before the Eternal Worm Devours Connecticut" effectively functions as this for ''Deathconsciousness''.
* AllLovingHero: God in "Hunter" forgives mankind even as he lays dying of arrow wounds, and allows all the animals on earth to devour his flesh as a final act of love for his creation.
* AllThereInTheManual: The 70 page album booklet for ''Deathconsciousness'', which contains a lengthy essay, supposedly by a professor of religious history whom the band contacted, about the history of the Antiochean cult from which the album draws many of its themes.
* AndIMustScream: The golems in "Earthmover". They cannot die or feel pain, but wish for death so they can be released from an existence that consists only of mindless destruction.
* AntiLoveSong: "Deep, Deep" is effectively about the guilt wrapped up in love and sex and how our procreative urge is at odds with our species' [[InYourNatureToDestroyYourselves self-destructive nature]]. Funnily enough, "I Don't Love" is less about this and more about a DespairEventHorizon.
* ApocalypseWow: "Earthmover" gives this impression, being the longest and most grandiose song on ''Deathconsciousness'' while describing the destruction of the world.
* BoleroEffect: "Hunter" and "Earthmover" both feature lengthy post-rock style crescendos.
* BrokenRecord: "We kill everyone with arrowheads, arrowheads, arrowheads, arrowheads..."
* ConceptAlbum: ''Deathconsciousness'' is a loose one, based around ''The Books of Terror and Longing'', the religious texts of a medieval cult called the Antiocheans who were persecuted by the Catholic Church for their heretical beliefs, which included denying the existence of heaven and possibly of God as well. There's almost no evidence outside of the album booklet that this cult or the Books of Terror and Longing ever really existed, so the whole thing can be read as an elaborate work of metafiction.
** ''The Unnatural World'' has a similar booklet, centered around spiritualism.
* CreatorThumbprint: Count on every Dan Barrett project to come packaged with a lengthy booklet expounding upon the concept of the album.
* DeathSeeker: The Antiochean cult was based around a complex and somewhat ambiguous form of this; rather than wishing for death, they wished for release from an existence that could ''only'' end in death. The golems in "Earthmover" play it straight.
* DeliberatelyMonochrome: The cover of ''The Unnatural World'', as well as the vinyl version of ''Deathconsciousness''.
* DespairEventHorizon: "I Don't Love" is about teetering on the edge of this and considering suicide.
* DistinctDoubleAlbum: ''Deathconsciousness'' is divided into two discs, with the first being called "The Plow That Broke the Plains", and the second called "The Future".
* DroneOfDread: "Waiting for Black Metals Records to Come in the Mail" begins with one, while "The Future" has some droning feedback in the background that becomes increasingly louder as the song continues.
* EchoingAcoustics: A big part of their SignatureStyle.
* TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt: "Bloodhail" describes an apocalyptic rebellion against God, while "Earthmover" depicts an army of golems destroying the world by physically tearing apart the land and mountains.
* EpicRocking: Very few of the band's songs are under 5 minutes long. Their longer tracks include "Hunter" (9:43), "Earthmover" (11:28), and "Destinos" (13:23).
* GodIsDead: All of mankind comes together to literally murder him in "Bloodhail".
* {{Golem}}: "Earthmover" is about an army of golems destroying the earth, yet wishing for death themselves.
* GothRock: A noticeable influence on ''The Unnatural World''. "Defenestration Song" almost sounds like Music/TheSistersOfMercy could have done it.
* HeterosexualLifePartners: Dan and Tim, they even referenced their friendship on ''The Unnatural World'' with the song "Dan and Tim, Reunited by Fate".
* HorribleHistoryMetal: "The Big Gloom" is about the death of Jean-Paul Marat, the event depicted on the album cover.
* HumanoidAbomination: There are several hints that Antiochus may have been one of these, including a legend from his time in the mountains of Dagestan in which he appears as a wandering sorcerer who takes residence in a village of the Avar people, acting as a fortune teller for them. However, when a man from the village offends him by spying on him as a crow whispers secrets to him, he disappears into his tent and emerges five days later as a monstrous being covered in raven feathers, who prophesies the complete destruction of the village before disappearing into the wilderness.
* HumansAreBastards: A central theme of the band, most clearly expressed in "Hunter".
-->''"Teeth and hate\\
End our relationship\\
Of course it's sad but that's the way it is\\
Your violence always wins the day\\
Yes, your violence wins"''
* {{Instrumentals}}: "A Quick One Before the Eternal Worm Devours Connecticut", excepting some muffled spoken word at the end, as well as "The Future".
* IntentionallyAwkwardTitle: "Holy Fucking Shit: 40,000".
* InYourNatureToDestroyYourselves: A major theme of their music, with "Waiting for Black Metal Records to Come in the Mail" and "Deep, Deep" containing some particularly notable examples; the former largely being about how our species' greed has resulted in us effectively turning the planet into a giant billboard, and the latter juxtaposing our procreative urge with our destruction of the planet and each other.
* IronicName: The band name, as their music is uncompromisingly bleak and depressing.
* LeadBassist: Though he's not the frontman, Tim Macuga could qualify due to a large chunk of the band's songs being built around his bass lines.
* MadOracle: Antiochus.
* MessianicArchetype: The prophet Antiochus, as described in the album booklet, is an atypically grim example. His life story, which includes a lengthy period of wandering the world in his youth which is not detailed by the text, as well as a martyr's death at the hands of the religious authorities in Rome, greatly resembles the life and death of Jesus, which the author notes was most likely intentional.
* AMillionIsAStatistic: Referenced in the preface to the ''Deathconsciousness'' booklet, in which the album title is defined as essentially an awareness of this trope.
-->''"Knowing that an individual death is meaningless - any individual death, especially your own - that you are not a person, but a statistic - and noticing, more each day, the countless deaths that occur around you - of other people, of animals, of insects, of the sick and infirm, of accident victims, of plants ripped from the earth and worms crushed beneath the blades of plows - of authors in their rooms, scribbling out desperate words in the backs of books no one will ever read- even the shattering of molecular bonds, the disintegration of atomic structures, happening in every moment, millions in each nanosecond, everywhere-''
''This is Deathconsciousness.\\
And It begs the question, 'What is the point?'"''
* MinimalisticCoverArt: Both versions of ''Deathconsciousness'' have this, with the more famous one having a cropped picture of the painting ''The Death of Marat'', while the vinyl release has a black and white photo of a World War I soldier with the album title printed below.
* NewSoundAlbum: While still genre roulette, ''Sea of Worry'' experiments much more with genre and some tracks even have a LighterAndSofter sound to them than the first two albums. ''Sea of Worry'' also marks the first time a Have a Nice Life album hasn't come with a booklet full of NightmareFuel, instead opting for a simple gatefold with the lyrics.
* NonindicativeName: "Waiting for Black Metal Records to Come in the Mail" is not about the act of waiting for black metal records to come in the mail. In fact, many of their song titles don't have much to do with their lyrics.
* OminousMusicBoxTune: "Cropsey" has one as part of its instrumentation.
* PerishingAltRockVoice: Dan Barrett's vocals are like this.
* PerspectiveFlip: "Hunter" is a perspective flip of "Bloodhail", occurring from the perspective of God as he lays dying upon the earth.
* PrecisionFStrike: In "Burial Society".
-->''"And I'll never know what you said, because I'll be '''FUCKING''' dead by then!"''
** A faint "FUCK" is audible in the midsection of "Waiting for Black Metal Records to Come in the Mail".
** The title "Holy Fucking Shit: 40,000".
** One in "Sea of Worry" as well.
--->''"Fell every tree in the forest''\\
''Put a bullet in every poet''\\
''Flatten every mountain''\\
''Level every hill''\\
''You’d best believe it''\\
'''Cause they fucking will"''
* QuestioningTitle: "Who Would Leave Their Son Out in the Sun?"
* RageAgainstTheHeavens: "Bloodhail" and "Hunter" describe a story, supposedly drawn from ''The Books of Terror and Longing'', in which all of mankind rebels against God, building a massive ladder from their own bodies to the heavens, so that "the Great Hunter" can climb to heaven and shoot God down with his arrows.
* SingleStanzaSong: All the officially released lyrics to ''Sea Of Worry'' are written out this way
* ShoutOut: "Holy Fucking Shit: 40,000", a reference to ''TabletopGame/Warhammer40000''. It also contains a reference to ''Film/TheTerminator'' as part of its metaphor of human beings essentially being machines.
-->''"Send me back in time''\\
''And I'll bring us back in line''\\
''Just tell me whose mother I have to kill''"
** ''Voids'' has a song called "I'm [[Series/{{House}} Doctor House]]".
** "Dan and Tim, Reunited by Fate" is a reference to the Creator/{{Capcom}} fighting game ''Rival Schools: Reunited by Fate''.
* TheSomethingSong: "Defenestration Song".
* TakeThat: "Sea of Worry" is one directed at the American right-wing - see PrecisionFStrike above.
* WalkingTheEarth: After being ejected from Rome following an affair with a wealthy noblewoman that ended with the woman's suicide, the prophet Antiochus spent 27 years travelling across Europe and Central Asia on foot before returning to Rome a full fledged prophet. What happened in that time period is left mysterious, but is implied to be horrifying. See HumanoidAbomination for details. When asked what happened during this period, he reportedly said "Simply life, and that was enough."
* WeAllDieSomeday: Antiochanism is this taken to an extreme; not only is everyone and everything doomed to die someday, they believed that, because of this fact, everyone and everything is ''already'' dead.
* WhamLine: The last line of "Earthmover".
-->''"And when their stone mouths open up\\
Just what words should come out but\\
We wish we were dead"''
* WhoWantsToLiveForever: The golems in "Earthmover" can neither die nor feel pain, but long to die anyway.
* WordSaladTitle: "Holy Fucking Shit: 40,000", though the latter part of the title is in reference to the tabletop game ''Franchise/Warhammer40000''. Apparently the suicide rate in the United States is also 40,000 per year, though that may just be coincidence.
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--> ''"Sometimes, I just... I just... I just don't know."''