Best described as a Progressive Indie band with post-hardcore elements, they had released two full-length albums ("Commitment" and "Sever Your Roots"), an EP/DVD combo ("Thought Control"), a digital EP ("SoSo Remission") and were signed to No Sleep Records.

The band originally started life in the spring of 1998 as "twostepsback", formed by Timothy Wisniewski, Mark Hladish, and Joel Coan as teens.

Through a series of line-up changes (including the mutual departure of second vocalist Jacob Clark and bassist Justin Uppenkamp), Mark and Joel eventually added Tristan Hammond as their bassist and backing vocalist in late 2003/early 2004; Tristan had, by this time, formed a friendship with both Mark and Joel due to their bands playing shows together.

The Felix Culpa's debut full-length release, Commitment (2004, Common Cloud Records), rapidly evolved them into a band with near-national distribution and attention from a rabid fan base.

The publication gave Commitment a 4/5 rating and hailed it as a "Post-Hardcore masterpiece" and "one of 2004's most underrated full-lengths," as well as stating that the follow-up EP, Thought Control, had "a better sense of melody, dissonance and all-around importance than whatever you're currently listening to."