Particle Physics It’s so great to have Motion City Soundtrack back and making music again. Panic Stations was their last taste of music that the band offered, back in 2015, and now after the long hiatus, MCS sounds as refreshed and re-energized than they arguably have ever been. The Same Old Wasted Wonderful World feels like the most logical jumping off point from Motion City Soundtrack’s adored 2010 LP of My Dinosaur Life, and front-man Justin Pierre still remains his quirky and captivating self on this 11-song set produced by Sean O’Keefe (Fall Out Boy, Punchline). “I think that if you look at a lot of our past records, it’s about ‘What’s wrong? What am I not getting right? Why do I feel fucking crazy? Why can’t I figure this out’…and I figured it out,” front-man Justin Pierre admits. “It’s almost like I felt I didn’t have an identity [in the past] and now by working through the hard stuff, I know who I am.” By finding comfort in the past noise and figuring out the person he wants to be moving forward, Justin Pierre and his other four bandmates have crated a record that not only lives up to the band’s legacy, but provides a reinvigorated look at Motion City Soundtrack as a whole.
The first lyrics in a decade from Motion City Soundtrack break through the void with, “Who’s to blame for all the secrets and lies? / It’s the strangest game I’ve ever played in my life / Some wear a dark heart / And sometimes there’s nothing to say,” on the mid-tempo opener of “Some Wear A Dark Heart”. Even for the fans wanting a raucous opener to end the silence after ten years away from the music scene, the brilliant chorus of “One of these days / I’ll break, and it all will come tumbling out / Until then, I’ll hang up the hope / That keeps racing around,” is sure to leave longtime fans with a smile on their face that the band has returned to form in the most thrilling of ways. “She Is Afraid” was the first single to be released from the set and it makes perfect sense in the album sequencing to have it near the top of The Same Old Wasted Wonderful World. It’s got a great guitar groove to it from Joshua Cain, while the steady bassline from Matthew Taylor provides a great musical path forward for Justin Pierre to lend his vocals over. I found the lyrics in the bridge to be the most interesting part of the song with the somber vocal cadence of the lines, “I’m not trying to cause a scene / I’m just trying to understand,” as it brings the entire song into context with the reasoning behind the lengthy band hiatus. Sometimes we have to take ten steps back to take eleven-plus forward.
”Particle Physics” features a nice cameo from Patrick Stump, who is suddenly appearing more than ever these days on guest spots, and the vibrant synths from Jesse Mack Johnson help lift the song to its intended heights. The song is largely about struggling with mental health as Justin admits on the shimmering chorus, “Does anybody study particle physics? / I just don’t get it / Why is there such a lack of connection between the things they say and the subatomic pieces I focus on? / It seems algorithmic / I flunked statistics / Perhaps I wasn’t paying attention / Is there a doctor in the house who could figure me out? / It’s like you need a PhD to get me / (If you get me).” The song ends with some back and forth vocal crooning from Stump and Pierre, where they harmonize and complement each other on the final chorus too to make for a memorable moment in the set.
”You Know Who The Fuck We Are” was a perfect choice of a second single with a chorus line/hook that practically writes itself with its great title. The band rally around Justin Pierre’s crisp and energetic vocal performance throughout the great-sounding track. “Melancholia” takes a moment for the audience to collect their breath and reflect on the material that has come before them at a frenetic pace, while the mid-tempo rocker offers some more lyrical context into Justin’s headspace. The opening verse of, “Disaster at every turn / One broken heart and an awful perm / Daydreaming in Joshua Tree / Kicking back whiskey and herbal tea / If it’s caffeine-free,” are fairly simple observations and lyrics from the front-man, but the delivery keeps them from just being musical wallpaper. “Your Days Are Numbered” brings the tempo way down in a reflective song about the complexities of relationships and obtaining human connection. The opening of, “‘Your days are numbered,’ she said to me / I only hurt the ones that tell me to believe,” offers a glimpse into Justin’s personal life, and yet he pulls back just enough to make his lyrics more relatable to everyone else. The track features a nice cameo from Mat Kerekes too.
”Downer” is anything but a downer, with its frantic and manic delivery of lyrics over a spiraling guitar riff from Joshua Cain. The back half of the second verse offers, “Dreadnought, shoving everything in one spot / Qualifying all the money that I shot / On high hopes for a mentally chill parade / But I’m still fucking anxious,” to make the captivating singer appear at his most relatable for anyone with social anxiety. “Mi Corazon” features a slick bassline from Matthew Taylor while drummer Tony Thaxton adds some interesting beats into the cool song that sounds a bit different than any ground previously covered by Motion City Soundtrack. “Bloodline” is a straight-forward rocker that takes no prisoners, and it pulsates with great energy and it gets in an out fairly quickly. “Things Like This” is the last track with a guest spot, as it features the band Sincere Engineer, and it ends up being a great way of wrapping things in a nice bow before the reflective title track closer. It’s on “The Same Old Wasted Wonderful World” where Justin confesses, “We’re so psyched to / Put on the nostalgia crown / We can’t wait to / Dig into the here and now / Stay in present tense somehow,” as he conveys the emotion of finding that same familiar feeling in not only the band’s music, but the connection they likely missed from their adoring fanbase.
The Same Old Wasted Wonderful World is a great return to form from this quirky emo rock band who have made a point over their career of “embracing the weird” and leaning into the music that they want to make. This album not only embraces the nostalgia of the past, but shines a clear path forward on where the band could go if they decide to venture even further down the rabbit hole.