Bowling For Soup

Lunch. Drunk. Love

Written by: PP on 23/01/2014 22:05:30

With "Lunch. Drunk. Love" Bowling For Soup have been going for twelve albums now. Yes, you are allowed to stand still in disbelief how their utterly idiotic and incredibly lame jokes plus an uninspiring blend of pop rock and pop punk can possibly have entertained people for almost two decades now. It was even entirely fan-funded so you can't even call the band out for being stubborn. If anything, Bowling For Soup have always been dedicated to their cause: to sing about boobies, beer, parties, breaking up, all the while using cliché jokes and frankly awful lyricism that'd make Wheatus cringe. Indeed, the band couldn't give a shit about what the haters think of them: they've been playing exactly the same brand of super-silly, lame-o pop punk/rock ever since their inception despite consistently finding themselves at the bottom of the well when it comes to critical acclaim. Kudos.

Anyway let's get to the point. "Fishin' For Woos" two years ago was awful. I called it a predictable pop rock borefest because the band removed pretty much every element that made them at least tolerable in the past. Slow, bland songs without any memorable parts and even stupider lyrics than usual, resulting in an album that posed a serious question on why they are even a band anymore. It felt like a joke that had gotten old a long time ago. Now, the good news is that "Lunch. Drunk. Love" is better. Much better even. They've upped the tempo considerably, and the melodies are much more catchy with plenty of sing along moments across the album. There's more of a punk - or at least pop punk - feel in the guitars and in the slightly rowdier vocal style that Jaret Reddick uses. As for the lyrics, well, opener "Critically Disdained" really encapsulates everything Bowling For Soup is about into a few short chorus lyrics:

Hey, I've been carrying the weight / But it’s easy to be unafraid / When you're so critically disdained / For being happy, smiling, drinking / Laughing causing an overthinking / Rocking while the ship is sinking / And we can even swim [...] We’re not here to change the world / We’re here to laugh at others / Maybe get a nap along the way / So dress it up the way you wish and step aside / And then meet us at the bar and we'll let you buy

You can't respond to your critics much better, can you? Especially when the song is a bloody catchy one, and a prime example of that pop punk vibe I spoke of earlier. Yes, songs like "Since We Broke Up" are as sappy as ever, and "Normal Chicks" is a sugar-coated pop rock song where the lyrics really hit rock bottom ("You're not Pamela Lee, but you look good to me. You're no Olivia Munn, but you're so much fun. You're no Jessica Biel, but you've got sex appeal"). But they have also included a song like "I Am Waking Up Today", which is instrumentally as heavy as Rise Against in places. Really.

In general, "Lunch. Drunk. Love" is about as good as Bowling For Soup gets on album. It's a record that brings together bright pop punk songs with big pop rock hooks and juvenile lyrics and a totally unserious mood overall. It's catchy when it needs to be, fun when necessary, and avoids the boring pop rock format for the most part. BFS fans should be happy about this one.

7

Download: Normal Chicks, Right About Now, Critically Disdained
For the fans of: Wheatus, The All-American Rejects, American Hi-Fi, Sugarcult
Listen: Facebook

Release date 10.09.2013
Brando Records/Que-So Records

Related Items | How we score?
Comments
comments powered by Disqus

Legal

© Copyright MMXXIV Rockfreaks.net.