Neck Deep’s Life’s Not out to Get You: Pop Punk At Its Best

God bless the youth. While our yesteryear pop punk bands are complacent with 10-year anniversary tours, Neck Deep from Welsh has grabbed the torch and hit the ground running. Their latest second album Life’s Not out to Get You is a gem that every pop punk lover, young and old, should enjoy. Songs like “Gold Steps” and “Lime St” are full of head-bobbin’ guitars and singer Ben Barlow pours his heart out on the album, with lyrics that will be strewn across Instagram and Tumblr for years to come.

It’s not as if Neck Deep is reinventing the wheel here, they stick to the tried-and-proven song structure with breakdowns and fast drumming. It’s just that they do it so well. It’s as if they borrowed elements from beloved bands to create their own masterpiece. Hard not to hear New Found Glory in the bridge of “Can’t Kick Up the Roots”, or Travis Barker’s influence on drummer Dani Washington’s extravagant style (the opening bass riff on “Rock Bottom” also sounds like a popular Blink 182 song). With the guidance of Jeremy McKinnon from A Day to Remember, they have perfectly melded the catchy melodic choruses of pop with the

The pace of Life’s Not out to Get You is another key to its greatness. Mixing in darker songs like “Serpents” or the slower jam “I Hope this Comes Back to Haunt You” show they don’t just write songs to mosh around to. But their experimentation sometimes comes back to haunt them, such as in “Citizens of Earth” a terrible post-punk song that unfortunately opens this stellar album. Luckily songs like the acoustic singalong “December” make that one slight easy to overlook.

There’s a reason bands that were popular a decade ago can still tour just playing their old stuff, because there’s not much else good that has come out since then. We had some drought years when the most exciting news was reunions of bands that should have remained on the benches. Sure we got The Story So Far but they have hit their stride and The Wonder Years bordered emo more than pop punk. But finally the gods have smiled upon us and bestowed Neck Deep for us to relive our past and dream of a pop punk revival.

4 out of 5 stars.

Buy their album 

Nightmare on Elm Street Reboot: Freddy at His Wit's End

Everybody’s favorite nightmare, Freddy Krueger is coming back to the big screen, according to recent reports by New Line. David Leslie Johnson (“The Walking Dead”) is writing the “Nightmare on Elm Street” script.

This will be the second reboot of the 1984 horror movie, after Platinum Dunes, Michael Bay’s production company, took a stab at it in 2010 to a lukewarm reception. Whether it was Rooney Mara’s lack of enthusiasm or entrusting an unknown director to helm a boring horror film, it never transpired to a movie series despite doing decent enough at the box office. Which was sad, because Jackie Earle Haley could have done something great with Freddy.

                Some are already giving ideas on how to perfect the monster icon. From the basic “what made the original great” to the common slasher movie complaint “can we get believable-looking teens?” The same can be said for any horror reboot. This list takes it a step further, suggesting that Krueger should “ditch” the jokester. But do we really want Krueger to lose his funny bone?

                This question could actually keep me up at night, spoonful of coffee grounds in my Coke can. Sure Krueger was more a silent killer (not like Jason or Michael Myers) in the original, though he sure took joy in his work, filling the darkness with his dry laugh. His comedy side only showed when he told Nancy he was her boyfriend now and stuck his tongue down her throat.

His comedy routine didn’t fully bloom until the third nightmare “Dream Warriors”. At first he was the anti-hero archetype usually found in 80s action movies, cheeky one-liners like “Welcome to prime-time, bitch” as he shoves the girls head in the television. As the series progressed he became more clownish, even to the point of wearing a Nintendo Power Glove and bragging that he “beat [his] best score” after killing poor Franklin.

            And that bitter taste has stayed in some horror fans’ mouths since. “Freddy vs. Jason” made it worse, while the reboot had us clamoring for the originals. Does that mean we should abandon one of his trademarks? The one that truly sets him apart from the rest? Jason’s got his hockey mask and machete; Michael Myers wears an indistinguishable William Shatner mask; Freddy’s got the sweater and hat, wears a glove with knives and kills you in your dreams. But his best signature has always been his humor, a sadist that enjoys slaying his snarky teenagers with a hint of sarcasm.

Plus moviegoers love a scary film with plenty of laughs. “You’re Next” was a surprise hit because the absurdity and arrogance of the family made people laugh, “Cabin in the Woods” was made with horror movie fans in mind with jokes and playful jabs at the genre. “Ash vs Evil Dead” premier is just around the corner, and it seems the gore will only slightly surpass Bruce Campbell’s humor.

As an avid “Nightmare on Elm Street” fan that saw the reboot in theaters twice because I wanted it to be good so badly, I fully support bringing another Freddy Krueger to the big screen. But if they neuter Krueger to be as dumb and stupid as his peers, just because it makes him seem darker or edgier, count me out. Cause then he’s just another boring vengeful boogeyman with a troubled past, and we already have plenty of those.

Comic-book Movies in the Wrong Hands

Reviews have been slowly trickling in and our worst fears have come true, “Fantastic Four” is an abysmal failure. Yes, perhaps fans and viewers should see the film before giving our trust to the critics, render our own opinion of how disappointing the movie is. But critics are hardly wrong when it comes to flops, and with a RottenTomatoes score below fifty percent, it’s very doubtful that anybody will the see good in this.

     And what a disappointment it is. The cast was top-notch – choosing movie actors with actual talent over small screen nobodies and pretty faces. Plus director Josh Trank appeared to be a fresh-face director ready to make his mark. Now Trank’s career is basically ruined and it’ll be years before fans get a better-than-decent Fantastic Four film, and most likely never with this kind of cast.

    Maybe there is a silver-lining to this dark cloud, or at least advice the studios must take heed from. Specifically Sony, currently ramping up for a third Spider-man series. The movie is still in its infant stage and a release date is a long way away, but it’s already taking a step in the wrong direction by giving the screenwriting duties to John Francis Daley and Johnathon M. Goldstein.

Daley and Goldstein are responsible for the recent flatulent “Vacation” reboot, beaten to death at the box office by “Mission Impossible” and just barely beat “Ant-Man for the second spot. They are also responsible for “The Incredible Burt Wonderstone” that not even Steve Carrell nor Jim Carrey could save. Sure, they wrote the hilarious “Horrible Bosses”, but more of that credit should be given to the A-listers that tried out comedy for a change.
    Yet Davis and Golstein are being trusted to write the Spider-man reboot? After the “Amazing Spider-Man” series was scrapped because the sequel had a lackluster box office (and because Andrew Garfield dissed a Sony executive), how is this any better? The few faults the movies had could be pointed to the hiring of Marc Webb as director, getting the job after the success of romantic comedy “500 Days of Summer”. Webb isn’t a bad director, but obviously the movies were more focused on the character relationships, allowing special effects and action scenes to suffer.

    So how are comedy writers going to do any better for Spider-Man? Sure the industry needs more creative directors and screenwriters to create epic comic book movies, and need to take risks as the available choices are becoming thin. But studios need to think long and hard about who they give control to, because giving the reins to failures or new directors is a recipe for a flop. No other movie proves that more than Fantastic Four.

                 

Fantastic Four Doomed for Flop?

Tuesday before “Fantastic Four” makes it mark at the box office, and there has yet to be a single review. That is hardly ever a good sign as it means either 21^st Century Fox studios has little confidence in the reboot and held it from critics, or the critics are so impressed by the film they are speechless.

                I’m going with the former, as there have been rumblings of issues surrounding the film for quite some time, mostly concerning director Josh Trank. Whether it was an incident with his dogs causing property damage, or the “Chronicle” director’s solitary work ethic that had producers worried. These events became more pronounced as Trank announced he was stepping away from helming a Star Wars film to focus on his own projects.

                Hopefully the reviews will start to trickle by the end of the day and calm any worries studios and more importantly fans may be having. The cast alone is a vast improvement from the Jessica Alba days, and the overall feel is also less campy. Plus the studio had already announced a sequel, so if the film doesn’t do any better than a lukewarm reception, any future plans will certainly be scrapped. Leaving fans to ponder: how hard is it to make a good “Fantastic Four” movie?