KennyHoopla – YOU NEEDED A HIT//
Genre: Pop Punk, Alternative Rock
It’s ironic that young, successful rock stars receive the most amount of criticism from the most passionate rock fans. It’s just as ironic that these audiences will end up supporting the star once they’re not young and scoring hits anymore. We always seem to dislike those that are more successful than we feel we deserve to be.
Pop punk has made a tremendously successful return to the top of the charts in recent years. Neither record labels nor grizzly rock fans can explain it. Perhaps there’s no reason to look deeper than the fact that this kind of music, when good, is instant, dynamic, and catchy. These are precisely the qualities that have created pop hits throughout the ages.
Out of all the pop-punk new stars, few make as an immediate effect as KennyHoopla. “YOU NEEDED A HIT//” sounds like the radio-friendly punk single that most bands struggle to write their entire career. It doesn’t take a long time to decide whether you like it or not. Like The Ramones or blink-182, you’re either on board or free to get on with your day. One thing that can’t be overlooked is the fact that KennyHoopla manages to produce rock hits seemingly without effort in 2023, quite a feat indeed.
The Dead Milkmen – Philadelphia Femdom
Genre: Punk
As it turns out, art doesn’t have to be perfect to survive through the ages. Stranger still, unlike previously believed, fads don’t always just appear and fade into obscurity. Some of them appear and keep being treated as fas forever.
Punk music, with all of its glorious imperfections, works a bit like this. Many of the classic punk rock groups never became concerned with acquiring the kind of musical chops that would ensure that their music would be covered by artists centuries after they were recorded. Turns out it didn’t matter.
The Dead Milkmen always had a pure, unprofessional punk sound that sound better than most musicians who could play their instruments. “Philadelphia Femdom” finds the group just as charming and as dedicated to juvenile humor as always.
Have they really changed? No. Could this be the work of the same band that produced “Lesbian Eskimo Midget Albino”? You bet. Is it getting old yet? Absolutely not!
