The Wonder Years
Sister Cities
Hopeless Records (2018)
Rating: 9/10
After a decade, the pop punk sextant from Philadelphia released their sixth full-length titled Sister Cities. This time around, the band pushes away from the modern pop-punk sound their five previous albums cultivated—taking a different approach with a darker theme to the material. However, it’s an album that should be taken seriously and not go unrecognized.
The first track on the album “Raining in Kyoto” is about singer Dan Campbell discovering the death of his grandfather while he and his bandmates were boarding their flight to Japan. This translates into a strong start for the album just from the emotion that resides in Campbell’s voice. He says, “Raining In Kyoto/It’s flooding the streets.” You can hear the shakey whimper as he sings. Transitioning to the pummeling bridge and huge, powerful choruses: It is clear how different this album is from their earlier work, proving they can’t be pigeonholed. Another important line in this song is: “I’ll buy you a candle, not even sure what it means” referring to his grandfather. “I thought that I would light a candle and think something, or say something in regards to my grandfather,” he told Upset magazine.
“I would have some sort of ceremony even though I didn’t know what the ceremony meant or if it meant anything at all. I would light this candle. I did, and I stood in front of it crying in the rain.”
The band has referred to the metaphor of lighting of a candle on “Cigarettes and Saints” off of their No Closer To Heaven record. Campbell says, “I lit you a candle in every cathedral across Europe”, after a friend of his died of a drug overdose.
Campbell belts out from his diaphragm with his unique, raspy style of singing, like in the song “Pyramids of Salt,” as the harsh-sounding lyrics of the chorus come in: “I drew a line in sand with these worthless fucking hands / I drew a line in the sand, you washed it away again.” Again Campbell has used similar lines like this before, referencing his “hands”, demonstrating them as “these”. There may be a loose related link to the song “Stained Glass Ceilings” off the band’s previous album No Closer To Heaven:
“They were cutting your wings off / I was staring at my idle hands / Maybe I could’ve done something / Maybe I could’ve made a difference.” That feeling of disgust that has clearly grown between “Stained Glass Ceilings” and “Pyramids of Salt” using a strong, very harsh concept of worthlessness, not idleness, unable to help with the mental health and well-being of a friend.
Title track “Sister Cities” has several bass-led verses and shouted choruses. “I’m laying low, a stray dog in the street / You took me home, we’re sister cities.” This is referring to the time they were lost and confused in South America a few years back, when a show of theirs got canceled and the band found themselves in Santiago Chile’s type of sister city celebratory statue. Campbell sings about wanting to find some sort of community, but still has a weird sensation of being an outside, observing dog.
“We decided we’d walk to get some food, so we walked through the bus station, and there are so many stray dogs just everywhere. I almost felt this sense of commiseration with them in this moment because well, here you are and here I am. We’re both in this bus station, in Santiago Chile, and we both have nowhere to go, and nobody particularly wants us here. I thought I’m going to bring you back the rest of my dinner, and we kept walking. Before we found a restaurant, we found ourselves under these huge, couple-storey-high obelisks that reach up towards the sky. I read that they are the monuments to the Sister Cities of Santiago, Chile.- Campbell to Upset.
The band explains the records meaning:
It’s a record about distance, or how little distance matters anymore, about how we all wanna love and be loved, it’s about how we all eventually lose the people who mean the most to us and experience grief and successes in these alternating tidal waves of joy and devastation, it’s a record about a trip around the world during a year that felt like everything was crumbling, seeing how humanity towers over boundaries, borders, walls, oceans and languages. It’s about connecting with people.”
Every time the pop-punk heavyweights write a new album it’s increasingly better than their last. Having a slight resemblance to Death Cab for Cutie and Radiohead songs: Sister Cities nails it.
The Wonder Years have become a powerhouse in the music scene and highly influenced by upcoming bands.
I think we should continue expecting great things from this band with the different style and sound they went for. Leaving behind the whiny vocals and not-so-serious lyrics, to a more mature and introspective type of writing.
It’s safe to say that the Wonder Years have made themselves a staple in the pop-punk scene and are now aiming for something larger.
-Kyle Voigt
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