“Pop punk was the quickest, most effective, highly emotional, lyrically convenient music for us to make, and it was the music we understood best,” Irwin told BBC Radio 1 in 2019. 24 on the Billboard Hot 100 and is certified 2x platinum by the RIAA. They hit radio chanting “You look so perfect standing there / In my American Apparel underwear / And I know now that I’m so down” on the guitar-heavy chorus, standing out against the polished pop of Top 40. There were ripped skinny jeans, a deadbeat town to escape, and youthful animosity towards authority.
This is how their biggest singles got them there.ĥ Seconds of Summer were introduced to the general public in early 2014 with their debut major label single, “She Looks So Perfect.” Produced by Jake Sinclair ( Fall Out Boy, Panic! at the Disco, New Politics) and Eric Valentine (Smash Mouth, All American Rejects, Taking Back Sunday) and written by Irwin, Clifford, and Sinclair, the high-powered track was the full pop punk package. With four albums now under their belt as songwriters and musicians, 5 Seconds of Summer have nothing left to prove. Then, 2020’s CALMstruck a perfect middle ground between the two worlds, with the added influence of New Wave, 80s pop, and indie rock. By 2018, the band realized they didn’t have to ditch their rock roots to embrace pop and scored their third No. Their sophomore effort Sounds Good Feels Good (2015) was more rock than pop in hopes of winning over skeptics with louder guitars and heavier percussion. Their 2014 eponymous debut album showed they could hold their own in the pop punk scene, but their predominantly female fanbase and association with boy band culture gave them something to prove. In 2013, the group went out on tour with One Direction, delivering feverous, guitar-heavy performances of their independent and unreleased music – the rock show before the pop show.