Tag Archives: reviews

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!

“Get Your Heart On – The Second Coming!” in reviews

It’s already been a month since the worldwide release of Simple Plan’s new EP – Get Your Heart On – The Second Coming!” The 7-track EP was released on December 3rd 2013 as a compilation of some of the left-over songs – in total there was about 60 songs – that were written during the process of the making of their 4th (and so far last) studio album “Get Your Heart On!” (2011).

During the month, various media outlets decided to review this EP and in order to let you know about the overall reception, I decided to go through most of the reviews that were published online and point out what the generally consensus on Simple Plan’s bridge between album 4 and 5 is.

Confront Magazine [review] – rating: 4/5

Alter The Press [review] – rating: 5/5

Pop Punk World [review] – rating: 7/10 *

Blast Out Your Stereo [review] – rating: 6/7 *

So So Active [review] – rating: 7/10

Property Of Zack [review] – rating: 3.5/5 *

Canadian Beats [review] – rating: 4.5/5

Ultimate-Guitar.com [review] – rating: 6/10

Craig’s Reviews [review] – rating: 6/10

Music Express [review] – rating: 3/5 *

Koule.cz [review] – rating: 50% [Czech]

Enemy.at [review] – rating: 3/5 [Austrian]

Aim A Trabolmeicher [review] – rating: 4/5 [Italian]

LivePhotoReports.com [review] – rating: 7/10 [Italian]

Dutch Scene [review] – rating: 5/10 [Dutch]

* – reviewer doesn’t state an exact rating, therefore the rating I chose to show is counted approximately and based upon the reviewer’s verbal rating of the EP in his/her article

Overall, Simple Plan’s EP “Get Your Heart On – The Second Coming!” has received mixed to positive reviews, reaching about 70% on average. And even though every single one of the reviews is different, there are many aspects in which the EP has received rather similar evaluation.

Let’s start with the perception of the songs chosen for the EP: in almost all the reviews (even the more negative ones), the first track – “Ordinary Life” – is being praised as the best song off the EP, reminding many of the reviewers of the band’s pop-punk roots. While the second song from the EP – “The Rest Of Us” is titled as the typical SP song because of its catchiness, two reviews (Ultimate-Guitar.com and Dutch Scene) agree that the fact that the band members are in their 30s, it reminds them of Glee – judging its (missing) authenticity. The “unauthenticity” of the Simple Plan lyrics on this EP is being mentioned by many of the reviewers, as one of the weaknesses of Simple Plan, as well as the clichés used in some of the songs. It can also be seen by the reviews of “Outta My System”, which is a song that has received the most negative reviews and comparisons to One Direction (Enemy.at), Rebecca Black (Property Of Zack) and All Time Low (Graig’s Reviews). “Fire In My Heart” hasn’t received much positive reviews either – many of the reviews see the influence of Summer Paradise, which also makes some of the other reviewers call it an “unrecognisable SP track”. The next song on the EP, “In” is another point, where reviewers started praising the EP – it is clear, that there is a certain sound that Simple Plan have created in the past, which a lot of people would like them to continue with (even though they have departed from it on the past album a bit). The two final tracks, “Lucky One” and “Try” – both slower ballads – have been perceived rather well.

Reviews are always a very subjective matter, but when put together, they can show us a more comprehensive picture of how an album, or a band is being perceived. It seems evident, that while “Get Your Heart On – The Second Coming!” brings a very diverse variety of songs (which on one hand can bring in new fans – each of them favoring a different style of music), most of the public (both reviewers and fans – from what I’ve gathered) seems to be prefering pop-punk over pop – at least when it comes to Simple Plan. Still, even though the past few paragraphs may have seemed a bit negative, the overall rating of 70% is quite an achievement for Simple Plan, who have never been critics’ favourites [go listen to “Shut Up!”]. In fact, the rating seems to be even higher than the one of their last studio album.

And what would be your evaluation of “Get Your Heart On – The Second Coming!”? What would you reproach them and what on the other hand do you think deserves a praise?