Music just means SOOO MUCH to Alien Ant Farm
When I last heard Alien Ant Farm, I was shredding major railage in Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3. Many years later I saw my cousin’s band open up for them at a local dive but I left before AAF took the stage. Suffice to say I have not followed their career closely. Here’s something I learned the other day: Alien Ant Farm has a new album coming soon and they recently dropped a new single. We need to talk about this, you guys.
Back in March of 2013 the band set up a crowdfunding campaign to record and release a new album. Fast forward August 31st 2014, AAF had reached 150% of their unspecified funding goal and released a new single for pledgers. Fast forward to me driving in my car a couple of days ago and hearing this pumping through the premium Bose audio package:
The song is called “Homage” and it appears that Alien Ant Farm are attempting to pay homage to a bunch of Gold and Platinum selling artists of wildly varying quality by name checking them all in a terrible song.
Rather than trying to process this abomination as a whole, we should try to look at it piece by piece.
0:03 – the song comes out swinging with the kind of propelling electric piano melody that you just know portends a bunch of awful overtly sincere bullshit.
0:38 – Oh no. Homey just actually sang this line without a trace of irony:
“And every time I listened to The Pixies with you
Purple rain falls on the dark side of the moon
Maybe I’ll take this journey through Zooropa with you too.”
For those of you too young to get the reference, Zooropa is a terrible album by terrible dad rock band U2.
0:48 – I think this is the exact same pre-chorus used in wildly superior Alien Ant Farm song, “Movies”.
1:07 – We’ve reached the inevitable fake-string-soaked-soaring-and-meaningful chorus. The lyrics gush over how much music means to him. I get it, dude. I was also 15 once.
1:45 – The band wisely references “Smooth Criminal”. THAT’S where I know you guys from!
1:52 – And in the space of four seconds Sadé, Brian McKnight, Kiss, Beastie Boys, the Rolling Stones, and The Eagles are all name dropped. The only reason these bands should be lumped together is if they were written in White-Out pen on the backpack of the biggest poser in history.
2:25 – That cringe-inducing chorus was not a fluke. We’re doing it again.
2:55 – “I got Joni Mitchell when I need a soul sister.” Word, bruh?
You can sing along to this tune with the band on the ANTarchy In the USA Tour:
10/04 – Sacramento, CA – Rio Ramanza Marina
10/17 – West Hollywood, CA – Whiskey A Go Go
11/04 – Portland, OR – Tonic Lounge
11/05 – Seattle, WA – Studio Seven
11/07 – Missoula, MT – Stage 112
11/08 – Billings, MT – Babcock Theater
11/09 – Williston, ND – DK’s Lounge
11/10 – Minot, ND – The Original Bar and Nightclub
11/12 – Minneapolis, MN – Triple Rock
11/13 – Fargo, ND – Shotgun Sally’s Rock N’ Roll Saloon
11/14 – Chippewa Falls, WI – Every Buddy’s Bar
11/15 – Macomb, IL – The Outskirts
11/16 – Des Moines, IA – House of Bricks
11/19 – Arlington Heights, IL – Home Bar
11/20 – Pontiac, IL – Freakster’s Roadhouse
Was this song pieced together as a blatant attempt at songwriting via SEO or was it written in complete sincerity? I’m honestly not sure what’s worse. What do you think? Am I being overly harsh? Did you like the tune? “Movies” still holds up pretty well, IMO. Did you preorder the record? Let’s talk it out below.
