“A great mix of power pop punk rock. Nice work All Time Low, nice work indeed. It’s far from dirty.”Power pop rock is such a great genre, infectious songs that just make you feel happy, you can sing along with the whoa oh’s and know that you’re in for a 3 minute 30 second burst of energy. This is exactly what you get with the newest release from All Time Low entitled ‘Dirty Work.’
From the start of the album it just doesn’t slow down. The opener ‘Do You Want Me (Dead?)’ sets the tone for the entire album as it rocks through tracks such as first single from the album ‘I Feel Like Dancin’ which is co-written by Rivers Cuomo from Weezer, ‘Time Bomb’ which is co-written by Pierre and Charles from Simple Plan, this song also incidentally features at the end of the album as a bonus acoustic version and my personal favorite ‘Just The Way I’m Not’ which is co-written and produced by musical genius Butch Walker. There hasn’t yet been one bad song in this power pop goodness, fingers crossed for the remainder of the album.
As the albums rocks along and gives us ‘No Idea’ a great melodic song, we hit the acoustic portion of the album with ‘A Daydream Away’ which is a nice little ditty and any song that lyrically uses ‘Douchebag’ in it is OK with me. I have no idea how to pigeon hole ‘That Girl’ it’s an interesting track, almost a rockin’ reggae beat at times, reminds me a little bit of what Sugar Ray used to do to an extent. Oh here comes some pop punk, ‘Heroes’ has a great groove, happy with this one indeed with the sentimental lyric “If we stand for nothing, we’ll fall for anything…” deep.
I was hoping the next song didn’t need to be mentioned as the title takes up a whole page. ‘Get Down On Your Knees And Tell Me You Love Me’ is a song that starts with hand claps so it’s an early win, the song is pretty good it even features a guitar solo, lyrically I think I get the gist of it, sounds like some shit went down in someones life, glad we all got to share that with them. ‘My Only One’ again sounds different to all the above, a killer song but it’s almost like the album has been split in two as the early power pop has gone but that’s not saying the second half of the album is bad at all, just different. The album finishes with um… ‘Merry Christmas, Kiss My Ass’ a tale of love and loss and hatred ha ha. I like this one, it’s relatable. This would’ve been a perfect Bowling For Soup song, it’s poppy and unless you’re listening closely you’d think it’s a lovely little song. It’s not. It’s clever.
Overall I liked this one, a great mix of power pop punk rock. Nice work All Time Low, nice work indeed. It’s far from dirty.
Tracks:
Do You Want Me (Dead?)
I Feel Like Dancin’
Forget About It *
Guts
Time Bomb ***
Just the Way I’m Not **
Under a Paper Moon
Return the Favor
No Idea #
A Daydream Away
That Girl ****
Heroes
Get Down On Your Knees And Tell Me You Love Me
My Only One ***
Merry Christmas, Kiss My Ass *****
Time Bomb (Acoustic version) #
Essential Information
Release Date: Out Now
Label: Universal Music Australia
Produced By: Mike Green
Except where noted below:
* = John Fields
** = Butch Walker
*** = Matt Squire
**** = David Kahne
***** = U4L
# = Remixed by U4L
Website: www.alltimelow.com
Check It Out If You Like: Power Pop Punk Rock, Blink 182, Boys Like Girls, Hey Monday
