https://youtu.be/lK5Sdj08Lco
“Catalyst, you exist to pull me down/you contradict the fact that you still want me around/and it's all downhill from here!”
I'm recommending this old emo-pop song because I messed up when it came out and failed to enjoy it. Circa 2003-4 when the mall-emo craze began, my mom was very much NOT about the whiny, high-pitched vocals of groups like New Found Glory or My Chemical Romance. Hearing her complain about them made them seem uncool to me, so I generally tried to avoid most of these bands (even though I secretly loved some of these songs and would happily embrace them when they had their reuturns as nostalgic connection points for my generation. Nothing makes me feel like a member of it more than when everyone my age in the convenience store starts singing along to I Write Sins Not Tragedies at the same time).
Unlike Panic or MCR, which really had a serious impact on a lot of people my age, NFG seemed to sort of come and go without the fanfare brought by a major star at the head of the band. Despite hardly any memories of hearing the song replaying on the radio over the years, the chorus always stuck with me--mostly as something to sing badly in “ironic" (i.e. insecure) appreciation. I was finally reminded of the song by the Punk Rock MBA, Finn McKinty, in a video touching on the era of emo it comes from; and when I heard the sound of the couple of tracks he showcased, I was shocked how much it was a sound that actually fills a hole in my collection--namely, heavy, drum fill-laden punk rock I can sing in a mega high-pitched angry sarcastic girly voice.
Actually its kind of shocking this wasn't my favorite song and band, having just been a 4-year Linkin Park fangirl starting with One Step Closer—and the fact that most 13 year-olds are ready to start getting angry at their mom for shitting on their tastes—but I didn't really have the kind of tethers in friendship or cultural identity that would've given me another sort of team to be on. The couple of boys I was friends with at the time were no more into that “gay shit" than my mom was.
I probably wouldn't have appreciated all of the lyrics the way I do now, granted. “Your good intentions slowly turn to bitterness(…)I can tell you're going through the motions(...) Which one of us will burn until the end?” …relatable bars for me, both as an accusation which could be levied at me and which I could sing to all sort of people I've had different sorts of relationships with. And there's something so snugly satisfying about reminding the one bringing you down that “it's all ⬇️ hill from here!”