- by Kenn Taylor
- Monday, October 31, 2005
- filed in: Punk
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Will the kids ever tire of power chords, sing-along choruses and tales of love? Only if they tire of life my dears. At the arse end of the last century the pop-punk of the likes of Blink 182 were part of the two pronged attack of the new American rock invasion; the sunny, jokey side as apposed to the dark, whiney, angry variety of the likes of Limp Bizkit. Sure they didn’t invent it, but they repackaged it nicely for a new generation unlikely to go hunting through the second hand vinyl racks for The Undertones, just enough to grab their attention briefly away from Playstation and edge them tentatively into the dark world of alternative music.
Will the kids ever tire of power chords, sing-along choruses and tales of love? Only if they tire of life my dears. At the arse end of the last century the pop-punk of the likes of Blink 182 were part of the two pronged attack of the new American rock invasion; the sunny, jokey side as apposed to the dark, whiney, angry variety of the likes of Limp Bizkit. Sure they didn’t invent it, but they repackaged it nicely for a new generation unlikely to go hunting through the second hand vinyl racks for The Undertones, just enough to grab their attention briefly away from Playstation and edge them tentatively into the dark world of alternative music.The early pop-punk-by-numbers of their second album ‘Cheshire Cat’ is represented here by ‘Carousel’ and ‘M+Ms’ with the pure poetry of: "My love life was getting so bland/there’s only so many ways to make love to your hand". While the main body of the album is made up from the polished ‘Enema of the State’ with the big hit singles like ‘Whats My Age Again’ and ‘All The Small Things’ included as well as ‘Adams Song’ telling the story of the suicide of a friend of front man Tom DeLonge, showing that they could do more than wank jokes even then.
While most of the rest comes from the more reflective, post globetrotting-success albums: 2001s ‘Take Off Your Pants and Jacket’ and 2003s self-titled release. Though still containing the party-boy of ‘Rock Show’ showing more of there other side on the likes of ‘Stay Together for the Kids’ and ‘Miss You’. Though they were really always at there best when they were up beat.
A few live and session tracks are tacked onto the end, as is decidedly average cover of punk classic ‘Another Girl, Another Planet’ by The Only Ones displaying some of their roots.
Of course this album will really only appeal to those who were first taken by Blink when they originally came out. Any older will view it as re-hashed shite, and younger are likely to view it as a bit silly, especially since Greed Day got ‘Political’. And if you were taken in them in the first place you already likely to have all the main songs and the extras are just not worth shelling out for. So there you have it. If you accept that few twelve year olds are going to dig Sigur Ros then you have to admit that this kind of stuff sometimes gets youngsters into music - for that reason lone it deserves a little credit. And hell, there should always be room for wanking jokes in music.
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