Category Archives: media

The reviews are in: media comment on Simple Plan’s new song “Boom”

It’s already been a few days since Simple Plan released their “zero single” Boom and its accompanying music video and various online media outlets have already taken to review this new track in their posts.

While searching for the reviews, I’ve noticed that most sources that posted about the song, mostly highlighted only the number of cameos in the music video without much comments regarding the song itself, however that is common for most news websites, in their attempt to stay neutral.

And while there is not as many reviews of the song as we’d normally get, due to the fact that the song has been around for almost a year after Simple Plan played it numerous times acoustically before, here’s a collection of the reviews that commented on the newly released studio version of “Boom”.

Let’s start with the negative reviews. While Simple Plan have never been music critics’ favorites, it’s interesting that out of all the reviews I could find, only one was explicitly negative – even the AbsolutePunk.net forums have been rather neutral or in between negative and positive [see here], which is nice for a change. The negative review came from thomasbleach.com, noting that the song has a “cringe-worthy hook“, “lacks originality” as the band “recycled old concepts and added a heavier mainstream sound to try keep it fresh.”

Moving on to the more neutral reviews, Random Paper Notes calls SP’s new song “pretty decent”, also mentioning that Simple Plan must be an inspiration to 5 Seconds Of Summer. The connection between 5 Seconds Of Summer and Simple Plan has also been made in the review by Canoe.ca, which states that the song “suggests that Simple Plan not only want to regain their place in the industry, but that its members want to compete with other pop bands of their kind currently on the market.” And finally, Boom also apparantly eventually grew on the reviewer at Confront Magazine.

And finally let’s get to the positive reviews, which seem to be predominant. Alternative Press recently filed “Boom” under “12 songs you need to hear from August 2015” and called it “catchy—bore-its-way-into-your-brain-like-a-power-drill catchy” and “a true return to form for the band—and not just because there are gushy lyrics like this: “You still make my crazy little heart go boom”, while also mentioning that “Simple Plan have finally done it: made the most Simple Plan song ever.” The already mentioned catchiness of the song tends to be the most common aspect of a lot of the positive reviews of “Boom”: Pertaining To Punk for example calls it “incredibly catchy and full of energy”, FUSE.tv then finds it “ridiculously addictive” and calls it a “sweet love song to carry you through the rest of 2015.” The song also apparently made an impression on Josep Vianaixa, who named it an “energetic old-school punk pop song and Hiddenjamsmusic.com say “Simple Plan is back with a bang!” And finally, I’d like to add one Czech review by iReport.cz, according to which the song “carries a classic pop-rock atmosphere and thanks to a simple straightforward hook has a very decent chance to succeed.”

Overall the reviews both from the media and from the fans on the other side seem to be rather positive, which is great news for the upcoming Simple Plan album. Make sure to leave a comment down below letting me know what YOUR thoughts on “Boom” are!

Pierre reveals his worst tattoo experience

The latest issue of Alternative Press magazine featured a page dedicated to musicians’ tattoo experience – both the good and the bad kind. And our own Pierre Bouvier was featured there with his story about his worst tattoo experience regarding his sleeve tattoo, which you can read about below or on the scan from AP in the gallery (thanks to PB.net for the picture):

“When I started working on my first sleeve, we were recording our third album. I really wanted it to be done in time for shoots that were just around the corner, so I flew my tattoo artist, Aaron Della Vedova, to Montreal to complete the piece. The first day he arrived, I got tattooed for nine hours straight, followed by a five-hour session the next morning. I was hopped up on painkillers and alcohol, so the tattooing wasn’t all that bad, but the next day my arm was swollen like a big sausage roll. It came down after a week, only to reveal that I was having a bad reaction to the red ink. After a month and a half, my body accepted the ink. It turned out looking great, but for a while there I was thinking I was scared for life. Since that day, I limit myself to five-hour sessions and try to keep the red to a minimum.” – Pierre Bouvier (Simple Plan)

APMAs to be livestreamed on YouTube!

Good news! Tomorrow’s Alternative Press Music Awards (APMAs), which Simple Plan will be attending, performing at and for which they are also nominated for, will be available for streaming live all over the world. There are two ways how you can watch the whole show along with the red carpet pre-show tomorrow:

If you have access to AXS TV (presumably if you live in the U.S.), just tune to the channel at 6:30pm EST, as that’s when the pre-show starts. The awards follow up at 7pm EST (until 11:15pm EST). Simple Plan’s performance is scheduled for around 10:10pm EST.

If you live anywhere else or just don’t have access to AXS TV, Alternative Press will be livestreaming the show on their YouTube channel at the same time (6:30pm EST: pre-show / 7pm EST: awards). I will be updating you through SimplePlan.cz’s Twitter and Facebook page throughout tomorrow night.

Simple Plan to be featured in the new issue of Alternative Press

It has been quite a while since Simple Plan have graced the pages of any U.S. magazine, so naturally their most recent appearance in the Alternative Press magazine is a big deal. Simple Plan are going to be featured in the commemorative issue for the upcoming Alternative Press Music Awards (APMAS), where they are nominated in the category Artist Philantropic Award [for which you can still VOTE HERE]. Their nomination for this award is also the reason why they are featured in the August issue of Alternative Press, that is coming out on July 2nd.

You can already check out the page mentioning Simple Plan in the gallery:

Jeff Stinco on Patrick’s show Ménage à trois + recap

This morning, Jeff Stinco visited the show of his long-time friend and former merch guy/photographer/webmaster of Simple Plan Patrick Langlois, called Ménage à trois, which airs on V Tele. Jeff came on the show to talk about Simple Plan, his restaurant business, music and travelling. In the gallery, you can have a look at some screencaps of Jeff from this show:

Thanks to Honza, here’s a full video of the interview with Jeff:

And thanks to Elsa, who prepared a recap for us, you can now also check out what the interview was about:

– Jeff did not say too much about the new album. He won’t give us a date because we all know Chuck, he wants things to be perfect.
– He also said that there are a lot of influences but in the end there will always be the SP spirit.

– The band has been together for 15 years and he said that it will always be a part of his life. At the beginning, they did not know how long the band would last so they were trying to have as much fun as they could.

– About his restaurants: apparently it was Chuck who initiated Jeff into gastronomy.
– He talked a bit about his restaurants, he mentioned his new restaurant “Mimi la Nuit”. But his favorite restaurant is Mangiafoco

– On a scale of 1 to 10, Jeff said he’d mark his charm as 7,5 (he also thinks that he is the most handsome member of SP)
– He thinks the best SP song is “Perfect”.
– If he wanted to move, it would be to Los Angeles.
– If he wasn’t with SP, he’d like to be a guitarist in U2.

– Patrick asked Jeff to complete the lyrics (of “Jet Lag” and “Your Love Is A Lie”) that he was saying and Jeff did not remember them at all
– Then, he played some flamenco and a little bit of Summer Paradise. By the way, he thinks that Summer Paradise is the easiest SP song to play on the guitar.

– They also talked about his trips: with SP, he traveled to 52-53 countries
– His favorite destination is Australia because the landscapes are beautiful and people are really really nice.
– He told little stories about his trips but the funniest was in Tokyo: The band was bored so they decided to go out. They found a karaoke but they didn’t sing because they had a show so they ordered a beer. When Jeff went to the bathroom, he saw several people, singing. Naked. He decided to enter the room and one of the Japanese looked at him and said: “Simple Plan?”. He said yes and they made him sing with them. After a time, when the rest of the band didn’t see Jeff coming back, they decided to look for him, found him and eventually joined him. Jeff said that Pierre was singing on the table while a Japanese guy was trying to remove his belt.
– Jeff also mentioned Brazil, he said that their way of life was really cool.

– He also told another funny story. He was partying with SP and Patrick in a city. Patrick stroke Jeff and they went out to talk. They ended up yelling at each other in French, which attracted a lot of people and… the cops. Which is how Jeff ended up being handcuffed to calm down. They released him about 5 minutes later thanks to an American guy that was with them. However he was very angry with Patrick for that.