Ten years have passed since Motion City Soundtrack — a band that helped define the late-’90s/early-’00s pop-punk/emo hybrid — last released an album. But between the revival of the Vans Warped Tour, the Millennial catnip of the When We Were Young fest, and “emo nights” that pop up at local clubs across the country, now seems an ideal time for the Minneapolis band to stage a comeback.
The band’s latest studio effort – The Same Old Wasted Wonderful World – may awaken long-forgotten emo echoes for some, yet it feels unmistakably grounded in the present moment. It helps that even though they rose from the same musical era that produced bands like Bayside and New Found Glory, Motion City Soundtrack managed to stand out as unique, even within a genre known for its outsider appeal. Their obvious 1980s musical influence, drenched in synths, and their smarter-than-expected lyrics, made them stand out in a scene rife with the sameness of skinny jeans and swooping bangs.
On their new record, the song “She is Afraid” was initially set for their 2015 release, but for whatever reason never made the cut and sits early in the track listing here. It’s the perfect bridge from the band’s early work to now, with the slow guitar intro, gradually building to an almost euphoric sing-along. It’s crammed with hooks, playful guitar licks, and singer Justin Pierre’s charmingly idiosyncratic delivery.
The band does occasionally walk right up to the boarder of quirky and cheesy at times, like on “Particle Physics” (co-written and dueting with Fall Out Boy’s Patrick Stump), where the lyrics seem a little too forced creatively (“It’s like you need a PhD to get me”) and a mid-song breakdown where there is an attempt to rap, but Pierre’s appeal still shines through and the blend of synth and punky guitars pulls it back from the brink. The mellow ballad “Your Days Are Numbered” is another one of the album’s low points. Dropped in the middle of the album, it completely slows down the record’s building momentum.
But most of the album is crammed with so many memorable songs that it almost comes off as a ‘Best Of’ entry (it’s just that none of these songs have been heard before now). “Downer” finds Pierre’s vocals racing to catch up with the songs driving drums and guitar lines, growing in intensity as the sound builds. Elsewhere, “You Know Who The Fuck We Are” sounds like a childhood raised on The Cars and Teenage Fanclub while “Things Like This” (with Sincere Engineer) is another impossibly catchy mix of New Wave synthesizers and sharp pop punk guitars. The record concludes on a high note, with the title track, finding Pierre singing over a lone bass line before the drums and guitars kick in, recalling everyone from the Pixies to Joy Division.
Though the album stumbles in places, The Same Old Wasted Wonderful World makes a compelling case that Motion City Soundtrack were underrated in their heyday and that their return is more than justified.
