It’s hard to believe it’s 2016. It only seems like yesterday I was refreshing my Myspace page and alphabetising my CD collection. Now, my CD’s are still unorganised and gathering dust and Myspace has become a ghost town, an urban legend for the youth of today about how social media used to be.
2015 has been a funny old year, some of pop punk’s heavy weights have released new records to shape the future landscape of the genre and UK artists have found success signing to American labels. With that being said, here’s a few of our highlights of the year…
The Wonder Years – Figure heads of Pop Punk, TWY released … and it was brilliant. They have again raised the bar showing that you don’t have to stick to formulaic song structures an evolve from previous records without losing the sound you have made a success of. Expect this album to tour in the UK soon and to be excited about whatever direction they move to next
Rule Brittania – Love ’em or hate ’em, Neck Deep have cleared a path for UK pop punk over the past 2 years, and 2015 saw a few british bands follow in their footsteps and sign to American lables. ROAM signed to Hopleless as did Trash Boat. Wstr joins the likes of TSSF by signing to Pure Noise as did manchester’s Boston Manor. Well done, Lads, we hope for some great things 2016.
Nostalgia Bomb – for all of those of us who are 25+ we were treated to UK tours from The Get Up Kids and The Movielife. Just when the impending doom of your late 20’s and 30’s made us terrified, we were all suddenly 16 years old again
Welcome Home – The later part of the year had a tease from Set Your Goals and The Starting Line, and now we know SYG are doing selected dates in the US and TSL are releasing a new records. Pop Punk be praised, it’s good to see these boys back.