It was all about who could dye their hair the darkest shade of black, who had the thickest eyeliner and who had the biggest problems. The emo scene run by bands such as, Taking Back Sunday, Story of the Year, My Chemical Romance and of course Fall Out Boy.
Sitting at the Hard Rock Cafe in Hong Kong, eating a giant burger and sipping a sweet cocktail I noticed a Fall Out Boy music video come on the screen. My friend’s eyes widened, “Fall Out Boy!!! Wow! I loved them.” I turned around to see the music video for, “Thanks for the Memories”.
Looking at the video I started to get slightly emotional, the video was then followed by a Linkin Park video which just made things worse. I said to my friend, “We were born at the wrong time! We used to love this music and wanted to make this music. But it’s irrelevant now, everybody is so quick to say rock is dead.”
Fair enough emo/alternative are subgenres of actual rock’n’roll but the same still applies. The bands themselves obviously seem to know this too. I wonder though if they care, or they just simply want to evolve because they are growing as people?
One thing everybody has always agreed upon is that Madonna is the queen of evolution, with every album she looks like a new person and has a new theme to her work. Be the music bad or good you can’t deny that she knows how to reinvent herself again and again, and people praise her for this.
However, when a band tries to do this they get crucified. I’ll never forget when My Chemical Romance’s, “Danger Days” came out. It was bright and high energy and full of color, it was an exciting ride through the desert. What do you suppose the fans said? “What is this? We want The Black Parade 2.0”. The lead singer Gerard Way said that the band had been through their dark times and had seen the light. They had grown as people and gotten over their issues and wanted to celebrate by having a colorful album. The fans, however, hadn’t quite caught up to where the band was.
So, where is this all going? Well, Fall Out Boy released a new song on the 27th of April from their upcoming album, “Mania” which will be released in September.
The song is called, “Young and Menace”. All the publicity surrounding this song focuses on the bassist and co-founder Pete Wentz struggle with manic depression. This song is all about not fitting in for whatever reason and trying to find your place in the world. Many songs have had this theme and this still keeps Fall Out Boy in the Emo category.
People are calling it the most, “Experimental” Fall Out Boy single. When it starts you feel like you could be listening to a Deadmau5 track. Patrick Stump’s vocals are really great, he starts out very relaxed and then just builds drastically. He is a fantastic singer everybody has always agreed with that. The track goes in a complete EDM / Dubstep direction, but you can still hear the rock guitar and drums. Personally, I really do like the track but it is getting so much hate online. There are a wealth of YouTube videos popping up every 5 minutes of emo kids (Yes they still exist…I have no clue where) ranting about just how bad this track is.
I found the video to be rather emotional and I wouldn’t watch it a second time just because it is really sad. The track itself though, I give props to Fall Out Boy for embracing what is popular and moving ahead with the times. Online, kids are calling it a sellout and are very unhappy with it. But maybe they are because they aren’t ready for Fall Out Boy to move on and become something new. They are still emotionally stuck or dependent on what Fall Out Boy used to be?
The song is worth a listen and if you like it or not it’s still cool to see musicians not being stuck or arrogant about the style they want to do. They are willing to grow and try new things, I would say that is a proper musician. On the other side of the spectrum though, yes maybe they did this to make money…but can you blame them? Everybody has got to eat!
コメント