#you went through the same boyband phase. you had the same first social media. and when you're 80 and 85 you'll be in the same bingo hall

[partywithponies]

Tbh if you consider a ten year age gap "a big age gap" and a 5 year age gap an age gap at all, that just tells me you desperately need to engage with more media that isn't about teenagers. It's warping your perspective of the world. There is life outside of high school I prommy.

[angeltriestoblog]

I Miss 5 Seconds of Summer???

A few days after 5 Seconds of Summer held their concert in the Philippines last 2016, I wrote a blog post with this exact same title then went on to elaborate that I missed the version of them that I fell in love with. I’ve unarchived it so anyone who bothers to read this has a salient starting point, but be warned: I seriously can’t make it through the entire thing without suffering from a chronic cringe attack—who ever told 16-year-old me that she could write?!

—

I have listened to 5SOS’ entire discography almost exclusively today. But my Spotify followers wouldn’t know. In an expert attempt to evade their judgment, I go on Private Mode so I can cry to their music in peace. I’ve also been watching a couple of their videos too. My favorite is this live performance of Ghost of You where Calum Hood does some immaculate vocal blending at the 1:26 mark. I have my watch history paused though so I don’t get bombarded with more recommendations and end up spiraling further down the hole.

It’s funny how I think that removing every trace of related activity on my corner of the Internet could also erase it from my own memory, render it as a mere figment of my imagination instead of a clear manifestation that I’m starting to like them again. And it might seem even funnier that I am convinced that people care! But then again, I did unstan them pretty publicly a few years back following a misogynistic interview they did for an issue of Rolling Stone, which also featured all four of them almost fully nude on the cover.

To this day, I continue to dissect the piece with one part of me thinking that I might have overreacted, having seen and read it for the first time when I was 14 and much more of a prude, and the other knowing that I did not. In one paragraph, Luke Hemmings admits that during the early years of the band, they took advantage of the amount of female attention they were at the center of. “They were wildest on their early tours, when they’d go to bars to mingle with fans after shows,” it read.

In another, Hood talks quite nonchalantly about his infamous dick pic that made its rounds on the Internet the year before, and how it surprisingly gave the band a lot of publicity. “Now I’m just working on the sex tape,” he jokes. “I’ll call Pamela up, like, ‘Hey, it’s been a while. We really need to hype this band up!’”

Having risen to fame as the opening act of the clean-cut British-Irish group One Direction, 5SOS was immediately touted as a boyband—next in line to 1D’s throne, or competing with them for the crown, depends on which magazine you read. Though this exposure granted them a huge teenage fanbase (myself included), they hated the label that came with it. They constantly asserted that they played their own instruments and wrote their own songs, and behaved in a way that well-curated, expertly marketed groups would not: carefree, loud, playfully and forgivably naughty. No one would believe them though. People would say it’s the curse of being conventionally attractive in the music industry. You were almost always expected to be a popstar, a commodity that catered to the masses. But they tried anyway: maybe a lip ring and a couple of tattoos would do the trick, sprinkle some curse words here and there in interviews, get caught smoking or drinking.

That interview was their final act: their big-time effort to break away and hopefully land a spot amongst the rock bands they looked up to and wanted so desperately to impress. Even if it meant objectifying, mocking, and taking advantage of the girls who propelled them to stardom in the first place. Simply put, that interview was them desperately trying to get rid of fans like me. And so, I obliged.

—

Now that I’ve been staying at home for almost three months straight, I have revisited a lot of old favorites: poorly written fan fiction I used to eat up in my early teenage years, full seasons of Nickelodeon TV shows (only the good ones) downloaded off sketchy places on the Internet, my childhood journals filled with my loopy handwriting and family of stick figures. I know I’m not alone in this pursuit: it seems like we’re all holding on to remnants of our past to remind us that we have experienced better days, and they will surely come again soon.

I felt like it was inevitable I’d return to 5SOS because they had released their fourth full-length album during the first few weeks of the quarantine. Everywhere on social media, I was reminded that one single was out, and then another, and then another and I figured that it wouldn’t hurt to give it a try. After all, I did give Youngblood, their third record, a spin when it first came out as well. I thought their attempts at experimentation bordered on pretentiousness, and figured that if this was the musical direction they wanted to take, I’d surely hate every succeeding record as well.

But the problem was I really liked it. Although it wasn’t a no-skip album, each track was different from the rest, all showing a level of inventiveness and mastery of musical technique not present in previous releases. After playing the entire thing again and again, even the songs I didn’t vibe with at first started to grow on me. Turns out the beauty of Easier and Teeth is in the details: the thrumming bass at the beginning, the unconventional vocal inflections, best appreciated in an enclosed area with the volume on high. My amazement at how their musical style had progressed over the years led to me listening to all of their albums in chronological order, then rewatching some of their funniest interviews which were alarmingly easy to retrieve from memory.

During these times, I’ve wondered why I still remain curious about what they’re doing, why I still give their music a shot when I see it on my Release Radar. They never apologized for the article and I assume that they talk about things of that sort even more now that they’re older.

And I guess the answer is simple. Besides the fact that the music is honest to God amazing, they kind of made me who I am. Having found them during the height of my teen angst phase, I reveled in having idols who were open about rebelling against the system and forging our own paths despite being looked down on by those older than us. It was through them that I was introduced to bands that further diversified my taste in music, that I started experimenting with a more introspective type of writing that led to the style I employ to this day. I made so many good friends because of them, some of which are still in my life today. Looking back, I wouldn’t consider it the best version of myself but she was different. More importantly, she was really happy.

—

I am well-versed in the discourse surrounding problematic faves, and I know that if I ever find myself in such a situation, I have two options: either go down the productive, politically correct road and steer clear from them, or continue to consume their work but with the knowledge that what they did was inexcusable. I teeter between boycotting their music altogether—because even Spotify streams can be translated into revenue and there’s nothing that powers oppressors like financial stability and fame—and choosing to separate the art from the artist so I can appreciate good work without the reputation of its creator clouding my judgment.

I guess at this point, I probably am looking at them with rose-tinted glasses. I heard that some victims of even the most abusive and toxic relationships look back at their time with their former significant others with fondness. Though what I had with Calum, Ashton, Luke, and Michael was nowhere near romantic, and their transgressions far from a personal attack, maybe it applies to my situation too. I look at 5SOS now through the lens of the 14-year-old who embedded watching Keeks into her daily routine, or fell asleep listening to Heartbreak Girl on repeat and rejoiced when it hit 1,000 plays on her iTunes. They are no longer that band, and I am no longer that girl. And while it doesn’t hurt to remember the times when we were those people, I must remind myself that things can never go back to the way they were.

Maybe this doesn’t have to be as dramatic as I’m making it. But that’s the good thing about keeping this blog despite getting published on other corners of the Internet—I can make it as dramatic as I want to be.