infinity on high - fall out boy (2007)
my very favorite album of all time. every listener of emo music has a fall out boy album that they're unhealthily obsessed with & infinity on high is mine. pete wentz's writing is beyond this genre & all the cliches of 2000s emo music...and the funny part is that a handful of infinity on high's songs weren't even written by fob!
so much lore & love & insanity behind this record. my very favorite songs are "golden," "ginasfs," "bang the doldrums," and "i'm like a lawyer with the way i'm trying to get you off".....but really every single one of these songs holds value to me & is so special in every way. i feel like a lot of emo tracks from this era fall short in that they all sound eerily similar & indistinguishable——infinity on high feels like an exception to that
i resonate with infinity on high's exploration of mental illness and queerness. 2007 was a golden year for emo & infinity on high is at the forefront of its magic. honestly, i just consider this record one of the pieces of music you HAVE to listen to before you die.....very cathartic and real lyrics combined with patrick stump peak composition. fob is a gem bro
black lines - mayday parade (2015)
mayday parade's most cruelly underrated album is my favorite one (and, it's worth mentioning, they're my favorite band!). i can't express the amount of anger i feel at black lines's lack of praise simply because mayday parade chose to stray away from their sappy heartbreak anthems & went onto PEAK NU METAL INFLUENCE. you can tell this is the kind of music they wanted to create from the beginning & i will never forgive the "elder emo" community for their disinterest and discouragement of such a beautiful grunge record.
my favorite songs from black lines are "narrow," "until you're big enough," "let's be honest," and "letting go." i can definitely agree that the lattermost track was the one that deserved the popularity it got......it's black lines's only appreciated track and serves as a kind balance between mayday parade's older sound & what they attempted with black lines.
i can't believe derek sanders can scream like that and chooses to make sugary pop punk breakup tracks. but i love this band to the fullest, all of their records, really........i'm just projecting my hatred at those who didn't appreciate black lines enough.
tell all your friends - taking back sunday (2002)
i'm twenty-or-so years late to the party of tell all your friends but this is such a cult classic in the emo world that i'm honestly apalled i didn't give it a full listen until 2024. my introduction to taking back sunday were the more popular tracks of louder now——and, later, tell all your friend's first track, "you know how i do," from my old singing instructor.
perfect song to open the album. perfect way to set my expectations high and have them continually met with every song that follows. "there's no 'i' in team" is the craziest emo diss track of all time (and it put seventy times 7 to the ground, sorry....) and constantly stays on repeat. "ghost man on third" is one of those beautiful emo ballads that your high school self would cry to in the dark of your room. "great romances of the 20th century" felt like a mayday parade song, so it automatically won my heart (though mayday parade was very much based off of taking back sunday....)
i honestly regret not having this album as my introduction to taking back sunday as it lead to me severely sleeping on them. or, maybe i've awoken my heart to the more grunge and alternative part of emo instead of the pop punk "emo trinity"-esque bands i've been so attached to. anyways, i need to find a CD of this one.
deja entendu - brand new (2003)
my album of the year for 2023; again, twenty years late to the party......but just about every track on this album is an eargasm (for lack of a better term). brand new has a terrible reputation in the 2020s (and for the right reasons, suck a fat one jesse lacey....) but it'd be ignorant to denounce deja entendu's phenomenal lyricism & performance. good god. literally every single song has something in it that scratches all the itches of little quirky things i love hearing in songs
"jaws theme swimming" has some swangy bass & is a perfect representation of jesse lacey's range as a vocalist. "okay, i believe you, but my tommy gun don't"'s little c-c-c-c-c-controversial part, "sic transit gloria ... glory fades" & its bass line which painfully evidently inspired mayday parade's "if you wanted a song written about you, all you had to do was ask." there's a part i'm always looking forward to when it comes to the songs on deja entendu.
why does jesse lacey keep moaning in the microphone? bro keeps whining, i don't get it, but i like it & i think it really works for brand new's sound. it's just one of those things where you have to separate the art from the artist.
small steps, heavy hooves - dear and the headlights (2007)
another piece of evidence that shows how 2007 changed everything for emo. i'm not sure if my opinion matters as someone born in 2005. anyways: small steps, heavy hooves is so grossly underrated that it hurts to write about. i can't believe dear and the headlights aren't known better. this is like panic! at the disco's pretty. odd. if it sounded good (sorry)
"mother make me golden," the least-streamed song of this record, just so happens to be my favorite. it's such a bittersweet and nostalgic ballad and feels like a song that wholly represents that album. "sweet talk" is dear and the headlights' hit & "i'm bored, you're amorous" feels like a paramore song turned folk punk. maybe a strange thought....the album's sound matches the album's cover. i've always liked when songs sound that way.
underappreciated. so beautiful. wish i sounded like ian metzger
from under the cork tree - fall out boy (2005)
one of my favorite albums of all time, and it really has been, for so many years. i wish i could go back to the moment i first heard "7 minutes in heaven (atavan halen)." i'm extremely dramatic about this song; it feels like a song that was made just for me, which is insane to say, given its subject material. but enough on yapping about that song.....this is seriously the greatest sophomore album ever released by a band! ever! "dance, dance" and "sugar, we're goin' down" on the same record is godly. from under the cork tree gave emos of the 2000s/2010s material to work with for years.
among my favorite song of practically all time (since sixth grade?), "i've got a dark alley and a bad idea that says you should shut your mouth" and "XO" are some of the most peak & underrated emo tracks of all time. i'd give anything to listen to this album again for a first time......i think it is among those that you have to listen to from start to finish, the whole way through, without pause. especially since fall out boy albums love to have songs transition into the next.
i'll always milk the fact that i got to hear "7 minutes in heaven" live. my favorite song since i was a 12 year old and i thought i'd never get to see it. please listen to this album because it changed preteen me