MODEL CITIZEN review - So, uh, I fuck with this pop punk trend

(Reviewed by Melody Werner)

Model Citizen is a 2021 pop punk EP from the band Meet Me @ the Altar. Suitably released by Fueled by Ramen, considering the huge Paramore influence on display, it was met with considerable praise critically. Now, I'd like to get right into litigating something that's been a big talking point of the past year-ish: the pop punk revival. While I was at the perfect age at the time to love pop punk in its heyday, I didn't listen to much then outside of Green Day and the many Walmart-core one hit wonder tunes, cuz I was a nu metal kid (I'm sorry I'm not sorry, you listened to trash when you were a kid too). But now? I'm diving deep into the genre. From Olivia Rodrigo ("waaah, she made a pop punk song, it must be a Paramore ripoff!"), to The Bombpops, to looping back around to Paramore's classic material (so far, I fucking love Riot!), to--you guessed it--Meet Me @ the Altar, who I decided to check out cuz the story behind their name is cool and I'd heard good things. And I'm glad I did, since this is a tight as hell EP.

One of the interesting things about pop punk that you have to acknowledge and keep in mind when surveying the genre is that it's not really punk music. And that's not gate-keeping punk, it just doesn't have much to do with the widely understood meaning of "punk". That's not a bad thing per se, but it's just conflating punk with angst. The "pop" half of the term is on point though, as you can easily imagine a lot of pop punk singers having solo careers in pop (Hayley Williams of Paramore was initially going to before she opted to form Paramore, and eventually still kinda did with "Airplanes"?). A defining characteristic of punk is rough production, performances that are more raw than technical--and that's not going into the often incendiary, political lyricism of classic punk acts such as Choking Victim or Crass--punk is all about this rowdy energy that seeps into everything. Fuck technical skill, we don't need it; fuck glossy production, we don't need it; etc.. Again, no problem with pop punk, it's just a marketing term. And yeah, MM@TA is not especially punkish--the production is crisp, the performances are technically really impressive. It sounds great, if that's what you're looking for. Big thumbs up to Téa Campbell and Ada Juarez for their sick performances instrumentally.

There's an insatiable catchiness to Model Citizen--it rockets from killer hook to killer hook to rad solo to killer hook with apparent ease. It's not the most heady or cerebral thing out there--it's pop punk, and it fucking rules. Edith Johnson is a phenomenal vocalist who conveys some real personality beyond the angst that it is so common in the genre, and she utterly murders the hooks. So many earworms in every track. Sometimes, the record can feel a tad over-produced when it comes to her vocals, particularly on the opening song "Feel a Thing". Other than that, I fucking adore this band right now, and look forward to what it is they do next.

Model Citizen is a fantastic EP that's got me excited for Meet Me @ the Altar--and also the burgeoning pop punk revival, cuz if bands can be this good in the scene, I wanna hear 'em. Model Citizen gets a 4.5/5, it rocks.

Awesome

Summary:

Kickass pop-punk. 19 minutes of infectious, soaring hooks and rad riffs.