#THIS SHOW IS SUPPOSED TO BE SATIRICAL GODDAMNIT

[objectivesubjectivity]

“W” albums recap.

6 weeks and 115 albums (or 8 and 163 if we include catch up albums), this is recap #23 of 26.

Discoveries

1. The relationship between music and weather.

I’ve found myself growing more negative toward music in the past couple of months. Maybe you’ve noticed. That could be for a variety of reasons: over-saturation, running out of blog ideas, a fear about what’s next for the project. 

Or it could be the weather.

How I intake music matters. Sometimes I’ll let an album wash over me while I’m in the midst of something else because I know that it’s probably not going to make the cut. Sometimes I tune out precisely because I’m looking for that spark that reels me back in. Sometimes I view the process of completing a letter as the more pressing goal rather than the exploration of my subjectivity. All of those factors disappear when I’m biking. For some reason, the intense focus on the road and its inhabitants allows for just enough extra headspace to take in and appreciate the music that’s streaming through my headphones. In fact, when I started this project, I was taking a good hour-long bike ride to and from work each day and that may have been a factor in its genesis .

It’s been damn hot this summer. Uncomfortably so. Too hot to bike. 

But toward the end of this letter, the heat and humidity began to die down enough to hop back unto my dad’s old Raleigh.

And I was able to bask in the music once again.

And I fell back in love with the project. 

So let’s hope I can finish the alphabet before winter really kicks in.

2. A “Plethora” of Pop-Punk

As I was listening to Gob’s “The World According To Gob,” I was struck by the idea that perhaps I didn’t own as much pop-punk as I thought I did (the count was only at 83). And, in terms of contenders, I most certainly did not like it as much as I thought I did (the count was at 1). 

But that didn’t feel objectively true. The shear amount of time I’ve spent with Bodyjar’s “How It Works,” and Lucky Boys Confusion’s “Commitment,” would beg to differ.

So I’m changing it up a bit (because this is my project and I can do what I goddamn please!). First off, the “Pop Punk Plethora” counter no longer has a time constraint: A New Found Glory album is still A New Found Glory album whether it was released between 1995-2005 or last year. But also, and perhaps more importantly, I’m rethinking my definition of the genre. A while back, I wrote about Green Day and how they were more like NoFX than Screeching Weasel, hence the reason behind not calling them “pop-punk.” However, upon a revisit, NoFX’s “Punk in Drublic,” is really quite poppy. And, to add fuel to the fire, so many of the bands I consider “pop-punk” cite that *specific* album as inspiration. (Also, I left room for reconsideration in that previous article so I definitely presupposed this would happen, right?)

So here’s my new criteria for what I consider “pop-punk”:

A driving, urgent drum beat with snare hits on the 2 and 4

Distorted power chords that have a tendency to resolve musical phrases on the relative 4 or 5

A concerted effort toward crafting vocal melodies

Harmony, especially on the choruses, even if they’re mostly 3rds.

An weighted amount of major vs. minor key songs, the former being the heavier.

So, with a more liberal definition of both “pop-punk” and “plethora” in mind, I went back and tallied how many “pop-punk” albums I owned, and added nearly 50 to the counter. This time, bands such as No Use For A Name, The Bouncing Souls, and Lifetime showed up to the party. This moved the percentage of PPP albums in my collection up from 4.2% to 5.8%.

I made sure to not just give a blanket “pop-punk” label to a band previously not represented: Motion City Soundtrack got counted for “Commit This To Memory,” and “My Dinosaur Life,” but not “Even If It Kills Me,” or “Go.” Jawbreaker got “Unfun,” but not “Bivouac.” 

Also, this changed the representation on the contender list because I’m now counting “Dookie” as pop-punk. So instead of PPP albums representing a mere 0.85% of the Top 100 Contenders, they now represent a more respectable 1.71%.

Lastly, this whole thing started percolating in my brain because of how much I was unabashedly enjoying the aforementioned Gob album. So here’s a list of “pop-punk” albums from my collection that deserve some props, even if they didn’t land a Top 100 Contender slot:

The Starting Line - Based on a True Story

Motion City Soundtrack - Commit This To Memory

Lucky Boys Confusion - Commitment

Alkaline Trio - Goddamnit

The Bouncing Souls - The Gold Record

Goldfinger - Goldfinger

Bodyjar - How It Works

Farewell - Isn’t This Supposed to Be Fun?

Allister - Last Stop Suburbia

Fenix TX - Lechuza

Lifetime - Lifetime

Pulley - Matters

The Ataris - So Long, Astoria

Jawbreaker - Unfun

Gob - The World According to Gob

3. Chumbawamba strikes again

With their brilliant, seething satire of US culture packaged in bite-sized chunks for maximum ease and enjoyment, Chumbawamba’s “WYSIWYG,” lands a spot on the list and join the ranks of Kendrick Lamar, The Get Up Kids, Beastie Boys, Weezer, Paul Simon, The Hold Steady, Less Than Jake, and Sufjan Stevens, with two albums in the running. 

Surprising Contenders

Oasis - (What’s the Story) Morning Glory?: I guess lyrics don’t matter that much after all…

Surprising Non-Contenders

Weezer - Weezer (Blue): I never really thought this would make my list (I like my Weezer rough around the edges) but I know how important this album is to other folks (and music criticism in general) so I felt like it should be, at the least, addressed somewhere in this roundup.

Taking Back Sunday - Where You Want To Be: This is still my favorite TBS album, but it’s also *still* a TBS album: There’s a soft spot in my heart for the sing/scream-along of lyrics like “If it’s love, make it hurt,” and “I said I’m gonna have myself in shambles before your folks are up and looking for some answers,” but I have a hard time envisioning myself playing these songs in public. 

Top 100 Contenders from the “W” Albums

This is also reflected in the image at the top of the blog.

Oasis - (What’s the Story) Morning Glory?

Reel Big Fish - Why Do They Rock So Hard? (+60)

Sleater-Kinney - The Woods

Chumbawamba - WYSIWYG

Odds and Ends

Total albums listened to: 2,047

Total contenders: 117

Total weeks spent: 89

Total PPP (Pop-Punk Plethora) albums listened to: 119 (or 5.8%)

Total Debut albums on the Top 100 list: 23 (or 19.7%)

Total +60 albums on the Top 100 list: 22 (or 18.8%)

Total PPP albums on the Top 100 list: 2 (or 1.71%)