THE PUNK GOES… ERA
From my first listen of Yellowcard’s “Everywhere” to “Still Fly” being screamed out by The Devil Wears Prada right through to Our Last Night doing “The Fate of Opehlia” now, I’ve ALWAYS been a sucker for taking pop, rap or something completely non-heavy and turning into a full-on moshing masterpiece!
Half the time I didn’t even know the original songs before hearing the covers but that usually made me go back and listen to them just to see what had been changed, what had been added, and how the band had managed to drag it into their own world. I love a bit of 90s/00s boyband cheese but give those same melodies to a rock or metal band and suddenly they hit completely differently.
A Day To Remember’s “Since U Been Gone” was one of the first that really stuck with me. I already knew the original was good but the lyrics worked ridiculously well cross genre and the heavier version just scotched an itch I didn’t know I had.
That’s part of what makes these covers so fun. You can completely change the energy of a song without necessarily changing the song itself. Male-fronted metal bands singing songs written from a woman’s point of view, sometimes changing girl to boy and vice versa but sometimes just leaving it exactly as it is. Our Last Night screaming “WHERE IS MY HUSBAND?!” without touching the lyric just makes the whole thing even better.
And honestly, that’s a lot of the appeal for me. I can already love the bones of a pop song without necessarily relating to the package it came in. Give me the same melody, the same lyrics, but with heavier guitars, screaming and a bit more chaos and suddenly it feels like it belongs in MY world too.
Also, screaming “WHERE IS MY HUSBAND?!” adds another emotion entirely when you’ve been single for what feels like six hundred years. At this point I’m not politely looking for him. I’m fucking sick of kissing frogs. My white knight has probably fallen off his horse somewhere, twisted his ankle and is lying in a ditch waiting for assistance because apparently he’s incapable of getting here on time!!!
There are definitely covers I prefer to the originals, especially when it comes to pop but there are also songs where the original artist is basically untouchable. Backstreet Boys, for example, have such a specific sound and aesthetic that a straight copy wouldn’t interest me. What I love instead is seeing bands take that influence and play with it without becoming a tribute act.
That’s why what Electric Callboy are doing lately has me questioning my entire taste in music. They’re not just copying boyband aesthetics, they’re taking that ridiculous glossy 90s/00s energy and smashing it into their own sound. Same ingredients, completely different meal.
Disney is another one I am ABSOLUTELY here for. Johnathan Young taking Disney songs into metal territory, Magnolia Park covering “i2i” from A Goofy Movie for “A Whole New Sound”. That kind of thing just completely takes over my body, I can’t control the vibes!
I love the Punk Goes… series, obviously, but the more I think about it I’m not sure was ever just attached to those albums.
I think I’m obsessed with the bigger idea.
Mashups. Covers. Genres bleeding into each other. Taking something that supposedly doesn’t belong in heavy music and seeing how far you can push it.
Music experimentation is so fucking hot.
WHEN COVERS ESCAPED THE COMPILATION ALBUMS
It feels like social media completely blew the doors off what you can actually do with a song. Covers are one thing but then you get mashups, genre flips ridiculous combinations that absolutely should not work but somehow REALLY FUCKING DO!
DJ Cummberbund is probably one of my favourite examples of that. Taking Snoop Dogg and Dr Dre’s “The Next Generation” and smashing it into Disturbed’s “Down With The Sickness” should sound like a cursed idea but it hits the ADHD part of my brain perfectly… LONG BEACH ENGLEWOOD! The Last Resort/Papa Roach mashup sent me even further down the rabbit hole because once you start listening to how cleverly he layers things together, you realise it’s never just song + song = mashup. Chester Bennington over Fred Durst, MACHO MAN!? Tiny samples buried everywhere, lines crossing over in ways you don’t expect. There’s so much going on and I absolutely love it!
Then you’ve got people like Rain Paris, Fame on Fire, Punk Rock Factory, Our Last Night and so many others who’ve built proper identities around covers. That’s the difference for me. It’s not just “here’s a famous song but with guitars”. They’ve already got such a clear sound that even if they were doing entirely original music, I’d probably still listen. Add a song I already know into that and suddenly you get that brilliant “WAIT, THEY DID WHAT?!” feeling on top.
And covers make me want to check out original music too. If I fall in love with the way a band has interpreted somebody else’s song, there’s a pretty good chance I’m going to want to hear what they do when the song is completely theirs.
That’s what makes the best covers work. They don’t just sound like karaoke with guitars.
Although, to be fair, I fucking love singing along, so karaoke with guitars is not exactly an insult!
The ones that really stick with me are the covers where the artist brings their entire personality into it while still respecting what made the original good in the first place. They’re not rewriting the whole thing from scratch or trying to pretend the original never existed. You can still hear its bones, but everything around it has been twisted into something new, heavier, weirder, more theatrical or just completely unexpected.
Punk Rock Factory are such a good example of this because they cover everything from Disney to musicals and TV themes and somehow it all works. I think part of that is nostalgia. You hear something you loved as a kid or something tied to a film, show or musical, but now it’s been dragged into the kind of music you listen to as an adult. It scratches two bits of your brain at once.
You already know the words. You already know the melody. You’ve already got the memory attached to it.
Now it’s got guitars!!!
Of course I’m going to lose my shit!
That’s also why artists like Jonathan Young work so well for me. Disney, games, anime themes, whatever - it’s recognisable enough to pull you in but transformed enough it doesn’t feel lazy. Simple Plan doing Scooby Doo works for the same reason. It’s nostalgia, but through the filter of the music you actually love NOW!
And live, I think that becomes more fun.
Recognisable covers pull people together ridiculously quickly because everybody comes to them from a slightly different place. Some people love the original. Some love the band doing the cover. Some are there for nostalgia. Some just want to hear something familiar absolutely battered into a heavier shape!
That creates this weird little community around one song.
Covers also travel incredibly well online. They’re instantly recognisable, they make people stop scrolling and I genuinely think they can act as a gateway into heavier music for people who might never actively go looking for it. If somebody only knows the pop version and then stumbles across a heavier cover they love, suddenly there’s a whole scene sitting behind that one song waiting for them.
And I think Our Last Night are probably one of the clearest examples of turning that into an actual identity. They have original music, but their covers are such a huge partof how people know them now. I’ve literally found myself checking their pages just to see what the hell they’ve covered next!
At that point, the cover isn’t filler.
It’s the event.
WHEN POP STOPPED BEING THE ENEMY
When I was growing up, everyone at school seemed to get put in a box. Scene kids, emos, metalheads, skaters, ska kids, the Hip Hop RNB lot, then the chav crowd with dance music and the popular girls listening to Britney Spears and Destiny’s Child.
It all felt weirdly tribal…
Which is funny because I was absolutely a scene kid/metalhead/emo band still wouldn’t have looked out of place listening to *NSYNC, Cypress Hill, OPM, Shania Twain or even classical music! My music taste has always been all over the place. There were whole genres I thought I didn’t like and then one song would come along and completely ruin that theory.
Electric Callboy covering “We Got The Moves” territory so perfectly sums that up for me. Something can pull dance, pop, metal and ridiculous Euro-club energy and somehow still feel completely coherent.
Back then though, it definitely felt like people were more defensive of their genre. If you were into heavy music, there was almost an expectation that you had to dislike pop on principle. Rock and metal were the rebellious outsiders, while pop was treated like this shiny mainstream machine you were supposed to look down on.
And honestly, that attitude has always been a bit boring.
When I first heard Electric Callboy leaning fully into that boyband-esque sound, I honestly thought it had to be a meme!
To be fair I LOVE that band, but I’m not exactly going to pretend they approach every concept with deadly seriousness… ha!
BUT IT BLOODY WORKS!
You get these soft ridiculously clean vocals, the little twinkling sounds, those very 90s boyband transitions and then suddenly… in all white, as we stand up in unison from grouped chairs, preparing for our best choreography in an inevitable balladlike pop chorus… it breaks down and the growls send us through the fucking floor!!
That contrast is what gets me.
Safe and completely unsafe at the same time!
It scratches several different bits of my music brain at once and I love that they don’t seem embarrassed by any of it. They commit completely. Even the visual side leans into that polished pop-group aesthetic, then the song turns around and punches you in the face!
With the German accents on top of it, I still maintain Electric Callboy would be incredible Eurovision chaos. Imagine the judges…
Then there are covers like “Cruel Summer” from Sleep Theory where you can really hear how easily a pop song can survive being dragged into heavier territory. The melody and emotion are already there. Add huge vocals, screams and heavier instrumentation and suddenly it doesn’t feel like a novelty anymore. It just feels like the song has found another form.
That’s probably one of the biggest things that has changed.
People seem much less obsessed with labels now and I’m genuinely glad about it. Your playlist can be completely unhinged and nobody has to call half of it a guilty pleasure anymore!
Metalcore already borrows from pop constantly anyway. Huge choruses. Ballad-style vocals. Massive melodic hooks. Electronic production. R&B phrasing. Meanwhile pop itself keeps getting heavier, darker and more aggressive.
And it’s not even one-way traffic.
We’ve got country artists covering rock and metal songs, metal bands messing with country Sleep Token tribute acts doing country versions, Jelly Roll crossing into rock spaces, Hardy sitting somewhere between country and heavy music and bands like Falling in Reverse collaborating with artists who would have once been considered completely outside their lane!
The walls are getting thinner.
And I think music is better for it.
I still love metalcore. I still love heavy music. But country has songs I love. Pop has songs I love. Rap has songs I love. There are tracks sitting next to each other in my playlists that would probably have got me kicked out of several different school cliques at once!
GOOD.
I can now happily sing “Thong Song” by Sisqó word for word with my tattooist Joel Heywood (Oceans Ate Alaska), with absolutely NO shame!
I think it’s way more fun to care less about what genre something is supposed to be and more about whether it actually does something to you.
Does it make me want to scream the chorus?
Does it make me want to dance?
Does it make me want to throw myself into a pit?
Does it make me feel something?
Perfect.
That’s enough.
PUNK GOES POP DROPPED TOMORROW
If Punk Goes Pop suddenly came back tomorrow, I’d already have a few recommendations ready to throw at them.
DREAMERS — “Black and Yellow” (Wiz Khalifa)
Fame on Fire — “Fireflies” (Owl City)
Our Last Night — “Habits” (Tove Lo)
Rain Paris — “Flowers” (Miley Cyrus)
No Resolve — “Set Fire to the Rain” (Adele)
Leo Moracchioli — “Paint the Town Red” (Doja Cat)
State of Mine — “Careless Whisper” (George Michael)
Jonathan Young — “Pink Pony Club” (Chappell Roan)
And then there are the songs I don’t even necessarily have an artist in mind for yet. I just know someone needs to get hold of them and make them heavier immediately.
“We No Speak Americano” — Yolanda Be Cool & DCUP
This already has that completely unhinged, bouncy energy that would lend itself ridiculously well to electronicore. I want the main hook intact, loads of synths, stupidly heavy guitars and then some disgusting breakdown appearing where absolutely nobody asked for one.
“Boss Ass Bitch” — PTAF
I don’t want this done tastefully.
I want filthy riffs, screamed vocals and absolutely zero restraint. The attitude is already there, it just needs someone to drag it through a metalcore production desk and make it violent.
“C’est La Vie” — B*Witched
Tell me this wouldn’t work.
It’s already ridiculously catchy, the chorus is begging for pop-punk guitars, and I can practically hear the gang vocals already. Keep all the sugary 90s energy and just shove a pit underneath it.
“In for the Kill” — La Roux
This one could go genuinely dark.
Keep the synths, let the verses stay atmospheric, make the chorus absolutely massive and then drop the whole thing into something nasty underneath. This is probably the one where I’d want less of a joke cover and more of a full reinvention.
And then there’s “You’re Beautiful” by James Blunt.
I know there are versions floating around online, but I want an actual heavy band to take this one seriously.
One of the most polite, fragile sad songs ever written, turned into something huge and emotionally devastating? Give me clean vocals, desperate screams, massive guitars and a final chorus that sounds like someone’s having a complete breakdown in a car park.
That is exactly the kind of unnecessary musical violence I’m asking for.
And that’s basically the whole point.
Sometimes I don’t want a cover because the original needs fixing.
I want it because I already love the song and I want to hear what happens when someone from a completely different musical world gets their hands on it.
Sometimes the answer is tasteful reinterpretation.
Sometimes the answer is more guitars.
And sometimes the answer is obviously:
breakdown.
MAYBE PUNK GOES POP NEVER ACTUALLY DISAPPEARED…
Maybe Punk Goes Pop never actually disappeared.
The albums stopped. The idea didn’t.
It escaped the compilation CDs, got onto YouTube, Spotify and TikTok, picked up Disney songs, rap tracks, boyband aesthetics, country influences and whatever other nonsense people could throw at it.
And honestly, I think that’s better.
We don’t need permission anymore for two genres to touch.We don’t need a special album title explaining this joke.
Sometimes a song just needs someone to hear it and think:
“Yeah. But what if this was heavier?”
And apparently that question has a LOT of mileage left in it.
PLAYER TWO: What song would you metallise and who are you making cover it?