Review Summary: Philly punks end their trilogy with another perfect album.
This is where the backlash begins. This is where the world turns and gets sniffy about Dan 'Soupy' Campbell and his band of self-styled realist pop punks. This is where all the praise goes to their heads, while pseudo sixth form poetry and super-serious self-regard kicks in, taking the Philly six-piece on a musical journey up their own backsides, because there's just no way album four, with a haughty, grandiose title like The Greatest Generation, could repeat the trick of the essentially flawless 5 star rated previous platter, Suburbia I've Given You All And Now I'm Nothing. Right? Right? Wrong. Dead wrong.
Somehow they've done it again, completing the narrative trilogy that started on 2010's The Upsides with an album that feels far bigger than the scene that spawned it. And with a widescreen, cinematic scope and ambition to match, The songs here are concerned with the same kind of important things they've always been concerned with; growing up, reconciling youthful ideals with adult realities, and finding a place in a world that feels like it's closing in around you.
Once again, Soupy's lyrics are on point, full of colours, characters, stories, smells, imagery and observation that bring the songs to life with perfectly realised drama and tension, finding something poignant and universal in the specific and personal. Ghosts, devils, depression and birds feature prominently. The words are full of neuroses and no-frills admissions of his faults and failings: 'Sorry I don't laugh at the right times,' he apologises on the opener There, There. 'I'm awkward and nervous,' Later on, there's a lyrical callback - one of several - to that same line on the coda of album closer I Just Want To Sell Out My Funeral, offering a sense that The Greatest Generation isn't so much about finding resolutions, but about striving to be better and doing the best with what you've got regardless. 'Jesus Christ, did I *** up,' in a moment of wistful thinking where you can hear Soupy's heart pouring out into the words, but in such a strong defiant manner that makes you believe every word.
Musically, The Wonder Years sound more at ease on these 13 songs than they ever have before, the other five guys whipping up the characteristically whirly racket when required or just stepping back and letting the songs breathe just as confidently. There are more mid-tempo moments on here than on previous records. Then there's room for The Devil In My Bloodstream's delicate piano balladry accompanied with the dulcet tones of Laura Stevenson, and Madelyn's campfire acoustics alongside their usual frenzy of sloganeering-style sing-alongs.
Quite simply, The Greatest Generation is the sound of The Wonder Years absolutely nailing what they're about - simultaneously working within a pop-punk sphere yet constantly pushing the parameters of what that means - to reach a realm all of their own, someplace outside of it. It's an often staggering record, by a great band, defying the odds, on a hell of a run of first-class creative form.
Recommended songs: The Devil In My Bloodstream, I Just Want To Sell Out My Funeral.
