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okay. I have my theories on this. first off when 5sos relegate a track to extended versions it’s not usually because it’s not good (they’re often better than the album tracks tbh) but because thematically, it doesn’t fit the overall album vibe as closely. The deluxe tracks from 5sos5 are a great example of this—aside from flatline, they’re a lot more sonically diverse than the rest of the album.

my theory is that youngblood (album) went through a lot of iterations before the final version dropped. seeing as they were writing it for a lot longer than the ridiculous 2 months they spent on each calm and sgfg, they had time to polish it the way they’re doing with their sixth album now. and I think the version of the album where wywa was a single was very different to the track listing we got.

remember how ashton said once that empty wallets was meant to be a single? and how that song’s a bop, but sonically it doesn’t really fit as tightly together as the album’s 3 singles: youngblood, want you back and lie to me (it does with valentine, but I’ll get to that soon). the line from empty wallets ‘sugar-coated pain’ could be a thesis statement for the whole album. and in early days that would’ve been a fruit salad of genres the way the tracks from woke up in japan onwards are: wywa is a reggae song. best friend (2018, just in case anyone is getting it confused with 5sos5’s best friends) kinda has those vibes too. what else fits in with this vibe? monster among men, meet you there, midnight, empty wallets. potentially also moving along. want you back has some similar themes musically that tie these together to wywa and midnight but against the backdrop of a very pop song.

then you have the earlier songs they’ve written for the album: the airplane/travel themes in lie to me and wwylm ended up giving a lighter feel to the earlier/middle tracks despite their really sad content that I think really captures the whole ‘sugar-coated pain’ and I think they built on that when they wrote youngblood. narratively it’s less of a breakup song and more ‘we’re in the moment, let’s sugar-coat the pain’. they proceeded to then build the entire album around it, and somewhere along the line decided not to make it a breakup album by including songs like talk fast, better man and valentine. which I don’t know how to explain other than valentine has some of empty wallets’ vibes musically, better man has some of valentine’s vibes musically, talk fast has some of better man’s vibes, and then it circles back to moving along which has some of talk fast’s vibes and then wuij has some of moving along’s vibes as well as youngblood’s.

and this was then put on the foundation of the first three tracks, and more right in the middle, the rock protest song that could honestly go with anything—and embodies the thesis of the album and unpacks it more—when you have everything you could ever want and you’re still unsatisfied and have unmet needs. that’s sugar-coated pain when you have to try to communicate it to the rest of society. that’s understanding some of the driving force between the breakup in wywa and the secrecy in midnight. they’re put after monster among men and babylon to give that perspective, and in the full 19-track (or 18-track, the story they tell isn’t too dissimilar between target and Japan versions) then circles the story right back to youngblood and wyb and lie to me—just with more context this time.

I’m not sure how far the whole reggae breakup album idea got or how many songs they would’ve had for it, but I continue to be fascinated by how some of these same sounds then evolved and made their way into CALM in songs like wildflower and thin white lies. like were they just planning on interspersing the songs with other ones they already had (wwylm, lie to me, etc) or were there others? I find it fascinating how they cut best friend as much as they could without fully cutting it—sonically it’s a bop, lyrically it sucks, it’s very goofy and very them a bit like a 20s version of pizza. to me wywa and midnights didn’t deserve that same treatment. I think both of those songs could’ve been polished to single quality, but they weren’t, and what we hear was the version of them they thought they didn’t have to work on further.

5sos generally choose which singles to release based on their storytelling value over actual song quality and it’s one of the most frustrating things about them. as a result it’s pretty much a given that a lot of deluxe tracks are gonna be single quality but they changed their minds on the narrative somewhere along the line. It makes me really curious about what an album would look like with wywa (and empty wallets) as singles. or flatline as a single. idk. there comes a point where they just have too many good songs, and that’s a good predicament to have

Forever mystified by how Ashton said when you walk away was supposed to be a single and then the song didn't even make the regular version of the album. From single to target exclusive that will never see streaming.

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The boys (and one very good girl) tackle the #TEETHchallenge

@Luke5SOS: I tried 🤷‍♀️🤘 #TEETHChallenge

I’m calling out my boy Jon @jonbonjovi unless he’s too scared

@Calum5SOS: Um... Petunia got pipes???

27 August 2019

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Luke in a friend's IG story post — Feb. 4th, 2019

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SCREAMING CRYING THROWING UP MULTITASKING ALL AROUND 😭😭😭😭😭

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5SOS posted on their IG story — Feb. 15th, 2020

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Michael and Ryan Hall performing if i had a choice in LA — Aug. 1st, 2025

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can you imagine 5sos singing still breathing by green day. can you imagine their little sgfg era selves singing it. because apparently it was meant to be written for them and I love billie’s voice too but I still feel robbed

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there’s a reason calum and walt whitman have never been seen in the same room

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a big australian man... i get sweaty in summer... just out here doing my best :)

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‘last night I lied I looked you in the eyes’ but it’s like a kid lying because they just learned how to say words and not how to make sure said words are true or that it’s a thing they should do til this morning

anyway the fuck do you mean two of them are parents now

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spotted in the wild: restaurant playing no shame

west end, brisbane

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I think 5sos shows could be made even better if instead of putting together a kit they would just scatter drums all over the stage wherever the other three won’t trip over them. then ashton can drum while running around and singing too and he will have lots of fun and it’d be really entertaining to watch. and he’d find designing the stage drum layout to be like a puzzle, and it’s important for him to have enrichment

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on the record

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Ashton posted on his IG story — Mar. 30th, 2018

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happy to pull out my own baby pictures from 24 years ago if anyone wants to know what a kid looks like with a tall blonde blue eyed aussie dad and a little southeast asian mum. my time to shine and give to the fandom or something idk

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Calum at a friend's birthday party — Aug. 16th, 2025

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dumb and sensitive forever