Album Reviews

The Salt Lake City pop punks known as Wicked Bears released their second album a couple of weeks ago. It’s called “Tuning Out” and comes with ten songs that will make you want to do anything but tune them out.

This collection has all the melodies and energy you could ask for, while managing to stay just rough enough so that the punk aspect doesn’t get drowned out by the band’s pop flair. Lyrically, they sing about everything from the year 2049 (it’s actually about accepting shit that bothers you instead of running away from it), no vacancy signs at rental properties (it’s actually about feeling lonely and without recourse) and shitty Reeboks (it’s actually about overcoming a difficult thing you’re not prepared for). In short, sad subjects wrapped up in happy songs. Even shorter, pop-punk.

Wicked Bears seem to be influenced by both Green Day and Blink-182 before they went shitty and end up sounding not unlike The Copyrights and Masked Intruder (minus the B&E references).

Track listing:

1. 2049    
2. Tuning Out    
3. No Vacancy    
4. Nickel Arcade    
5. Reebok Classics    
6. We Got Robbed    
7. Cameron
8. 60 WPM    
9. Chattering Teeth    
10. Mega Powers