Pitchfork Reviews Mid-2000s Emo

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Is it just me or is ever pop-punker whining about wasting their youth and begging an uninterested woman (more an idealized manifestation of unattainable female perfection than an actual person) to “carry them home?” In the year 2007, pop-punk, a genre that once seemed rich with promise, has found itself stuck in rut of self-serious, mopey, cliche. And no band is more guilty of complacency with emo’s lack of initiative than All Time Low.

Their new single, “Coffee Shop Soundtrack,” sounds like it was tailor-made to be played at whatever the suburban mall with both a Hot Topic and Spencer’s Gifts franchise’s equivalent of a Starbuck’s may be (Orange Julius?). It’s as inoffensive--and forgettable--as PP gets. While it’s playing, it’s simply there. It’s emotional; even your mom could definitely identity if as such. But once its 3:15 seconds come to a sudden close, it’s as distant as the last time someone without a purple hoodie and bleached bangs really (italicized) got you.

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With their debut album The Same Old Blood with a New Touch, Buffalo's emo darlings Cute Is What We Aim For seem to almost mock the boyish self-indulgence that chokes each new release from Fueled By Ramen. From the very start of  "The Curse of Curves," frontman Shaant Hacikyan goes right for the teenaged heart with his croon, whinier than a tween who just lost her WiFi connection and more confident than a bratty Green Day member screaming vitriol about the Tea Party. His voice would be almost endearingly sophomoric if not for the lyrics, rife with weak metaphors and junior high sexuality – "Her bone structure screams ‘Touch her! Touch her!’/And she's got the curse of curves." It's hard to argue that the lyrics aren't fitting of their audience; if not for the bands' collective age, the song would feel at home in a middle school talent show, or better yet, a teenaged diary.

The production is the standard pop-punk fare: power chords with a bit of noodling to spice things up. Without Hacikyan's trademark moan, this song could be on almost any album from an imprint like Fueled By Ramen or Hopeless Records. So while it's not exactly melodic, it's hard to argue with a boyish whine when it’s the bands closest thing to originality.

- Sasha Geffen

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Gerard Way might promise that he’s not doing ok, but the vitality of My Chemical Romance’s latest single from Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge suggests otherwise. The guitars furiously soar throughout the track. Mike Pellisier pounds the shit out of his kit like it broke his heart. Way may be the first emo frontman to embrace his role in a traditional sense--his vocals are full of Jagger’s swagger, Corgan’s grit, Presley’s dramatic inflection, and Manson’s theatricality.

I imagine listening to McR in 04 is a lot like hearing Nivrana in 94. It’s exciting, it’s new, it’s good, and, most importantly, it’s only the beginning. Big things are coming for emo’s goth obsessed misfits, and I can’t wait to see what the future holds.

- Jamieson Cox

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What is Gabe Saporta better at than making middling music? Despite the band’s  psychedelic trip through the desert mythology, Cobra Starship continues to be just as unmemorable and sobering as its predecessor Midtown with their new single “Guilty Pleasure.” It’s paint-by-numbers pop-punk; you have your plodding riff, your your out of place synth, your blasé lyrics written with audience participation in mind--theres even mid tempo respite from the bubble gum inundation at the tail of the song for good measure. “Guilty Pleasure” sounds like it was written to be a crossover hit in the vein of Saporta’s Fueled By Ramen label mates Fallout Boy and Panic! At the Disco--and therein lies the problem. There are plenty of other bands more worthy of your time doing the exact same thing, but better.

- Jeremy Gordon

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After hinting at more pop and less punk aspirations on their commercial debut Take This to Your Grave, Fall Out Boy follow up on their promise with their new track, “Of All the Gin Joints in the World.” All the familiar elements are here- punchy power chords, palm muted break downs and patrick stumps sunny day real estate cum blue eyed soul vocal delivery. This time around however, Cheap Trick serves just as much an influence as Blink-182. 

“Of All the Gin Joints in the World” forecasts a bright future for the genre of pop punk-- a future in which it moves from the suburban malls to all of pop radio. One where Pete Wentz’s dip died bangs inspire as much pre teen devotion as Timberlake’s curls. It seems as though From Under the Cork Tree has such a potential to bring about about a sea change in popular music, FoB might as well rename it “The Shape of Pop-Punk To Come.”

- Mark Richardson