EP REVIEW: Try What You Want, Just Make Sure It Works – Home Wrecked

Try What You Want, Just Make Sure It Works is the second EP from Yorkshire based pop-punk band HOME WRECKED. Following the massive success of NECK DEEP it feels like the UK pop-punk scene is continuing to grow as bands all want a taste of that success.

HOME WRECKED take a real kitchen sink approach to pop-punk with this EP. Opening track Moving Day draws more from the emo side of things. Whilst it still has all the bounce you’d expect from a pop-punk song it’s less joyful than you’d expect. Lyrically it’s a little more downbeat as well as Home Wrecked are clearly striving for a more mature pop-punk sound here. Back On The Grid is more of a straight up pop-punk tune with all the typical elements you’d expect. It’s not a terrible song but also ends up being the most forgettable moment on the EP.

Nothing Like You is the acoustic ballad that every pop-punk band feels like they have to do now. Most of the time these feel like pop-punk bands just checking a box and end up ranging from boring to terrible. And whilst this is far from the worst it still comes across as uninspired. Especially when the guest vocals provided by Christina Rotondo come in. Her performance on the track is impressive but just feels like something that’s been done time and time again.

This is then followed with Back On The Grid, which feels like a throwback to the easycore days of 2010. Complete with a breakdown just tacked onto the end. Closing track Stepping Stones is another dose of bouncy pop-punk that does very little to stand out at the end of the EP. HOME WRECKED try to cover several different elements of pop-punk over five songs and it ends up with most of the songs feeling half baked. They just lack any real identity and instead just take a jukebox approach to a genre that in recent years has become painfully derivative. Even vocalist Joe Daniels uses the same fake American accent we’ve heard over and over again. Whilst there are some catchy melodies, every syllable is stretched out in the same way so many other pop-punk vocalists do. This doesn’t necessarily make the vocals bad but like so much else here it’s just uninspired.

Try What You Want, Just Make Sure It Works isn’t a terrible EP. And it’s no doubt something that plenty of pop-punk fans will enjoy. But it just highlights how dull and derivative pop-punk has become as a genre. So many bands just doing the same thing in a desperate attempt to mimic the success of other bands. HOME WRECKED are certainly capable of delivering something impressive in the future as this is only their second EP. They just need to find their own identity if they want to stand out in the future.

Rating: 5/10

Try What You Want, Just Make Sure It Works is out now via Primordial Records.

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