Fall Out Boy Is Totally Lame

Fall Out Boy
Infinity On High (Island)
Grade: D

Download:
Fall Out Boy - "Thnks fr th Mmrs"
Download:
My Chemical Romance - "The Sharpest Lives"

As you all know, I love the pop-punk music. Always have, always will; it's just the way I'm made. All my friends hide their faces in their hands whenever this fact comes up in conversation, they claim to wonder how I have yet been unable to leave the lame TRL-annointed genre behind. The answer: I love the hooks.

Personal City Pages-esque digression aside, this means that I pick up a copy of every major pop-punk release, and last week's Fall Out Boy record was next on my list.

Unfortunately, it turns out that Fall Out Boy's new record Infinity On High sucks complete ass. Apparently, they've lost all that was good (in the pop-punk sense) and green about them and replaced that void with the worst aspects Maroon 5 and best aspects of My Chemical Romance. Seriously, what were producer Neal Avron and FOB thinking? Granted, Jay-Z makes a special guest appearance on the lead track "Thriller," which is definitely cool because Jay-Z owns, but there are 1.5 good songs on the album, "This Ain't A Scene It's An Arms Race" is by far the best.

"Golden," the soft piano jam avec strings is one of the worst songs I've heard, check out this lyric: "Tongues on the sockets of electric dreams when the sewage of youth drowned the spark of my teens," it sounds like they ripped it off from "My Lady 'L,'" the song written by that tall guy from "Freaks and Geeks" for Lindsay Wier.

However, the true kicker is "Thnks fr the Mmrs" ("Thanks for the Memories" for those who appreciate vowels), which appears to be thrown in after the band realized My Chemical Romance's Black Parade totally kicked ass and sold records. With a near identical verse, chord progession and mood as My Chemical Romance's "The Sharp Lives," which is actually a killer song, I haven't heard as big of a rip off as this since Green Day's "American Idiot" ripping off Dillinger Four.

Here are the two songs next to each other. Specifically, listen to the first 30 seconds of each song right after the other and be shocked.

(Ian Anderson)