During an age when disco has made its pop music return through the likes of The Weeknd and Dua Lipa, punk rock, or rather neo punk as also found new life. With Machine Gun Kelly’s 2020 album ‘Tickets to My Downfall’, millennials began to experience heavy nostalgia for the Blink 182 era of neo punk rock, and the train continued rolling on with pop singers as widespread as Halsey and Olivia Rodrigo getting in on the action. MGK’s album could have been a one off, or even a failure as its title implied, but instead it appears to have breathed life into a neo-neo punk movement.
Perhaps, however, it remains simply neo punk, as Travis Barker features prominently in the musical backing of MGK and even younger up and coming artists like KennyHoopla. Indeed, the gap in time between Blink 182s heyday and the modern punk singers is the main distinguishing factor between neo punk and neo-neo punk, as the music at times sounds identical. There is a comical aspect to it all, or at least in the MGK and Barker side of the genre, which is that the lyrics and themes lean heavily on angst despite Barker and Kelly having spent a collective 76 years on Earth.
Not all neo-neo punk participants are age confused, however. Olivia Rodrigo, just 18, parlayed a smash pop ballad into an album that includes a follow up hit, ‘Good 4 U’, a neo-neo punk track which is unquestionably ripped from Paramore’s ‘07 ‘Misery Business’. Rodrigo may well not return to the genre, but her age certainly allows her to fit in nicely with its teenage and early 20s related themes. Perhaps, however, the goal of the genre, or return to it (depending on how you view this), is simply to make nostalgia inducing tracks for a generation old enough to not feel the emotions of the singers, but young enough to remember feeling them. This may speak less to musicians not being innovative than it does to the commercial viability of products that appeal to millennials' quiet longing for the simplicity of the past, or at least for a past they remember as simple. Or, it may speak more to millions of millennials being back in their home town during the pandemic and reliving a less intense version of their teenage years with new music to accompany this partial return to youth..
It’s unclear if disco and neo punk will continue being revisited by modern stars, and if they are one wonders what other genres will see a resurgence (90s Hip-Hop?). While that remains to be seen, what we know now is that a return to music about teenage angst can only spell trouble for parents and “the establishment” around the world.
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