5 Seconds of Summer Explains Why ‘She’s Kinda Hot’ Sounds Like My Chemical Romance
Ah, the Teen Choice Awards. The mecca of adolescence, where the only thing that pounds louder than 5 Seconds of Summer percussionist Ashton Irwin’s kick drum are the heart beats of a thousand teen girls.
5SOS were on hand to perform its new single “She’s Kinda Hot” on live television for the first time, after announcing last week that sophomore album Sounds Good Feels Good will be released on Oct. 23. Two new songs from the album, which follows last year’s self-titled debut, were previewed on Friday (Aug. 14) with an official album trailer as well.
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“The new record is super personal to us,” drummer Ashton Irwin told Billboard on the Teen Choice Awards red carpet. “We all lived in a house together and recorded it and wrote it. We just care about it a lot. It’s definitely an evolution from the last album. It’s a bigger, more rocking sound.”
“There’s lots of different shit on it,” added guitarist Michael Clifford. “It’s really diverse. There are lots of key sounds we go to.”
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On the title Sounds Good Feels Good, Irwin says, “‘Feels Good’ came from the beginning of one of the singles we’re about to put out. [Singer/guitarist] Luke [Hemmings] said it in the studio after we recorded it. He said, ‘Sounds good! Feels good!’ and we were like, ‘There it is!’”
“It encapsulates the whole album’s sound,” Hemmings chimed in. “It sounds badass. It reminds of, like, an ‘80s M?tley Crüe title.”
Some 5SOS fans have pointed out that “She’s Kinda Hot,” which debuted at No. 22 on the Hot 100 chart following its release, sounds eerily similar to My Chemical Romance’s song “Teenagers,” from the now-defunct band’s 2006 album The Black Parade. 5 Seconds of Summer is not shying away from the comparison, and wants fans to understand why the similarities — which have already produced a few YouTube mash-ups — exist.
“That’s just because of the 12-bar blues,” Clifford explains. “I think it might be in the same key as well. People were like, ‘You guys should sound more like My Chemical Romance.’ Then we do sound like My Chemical Romance and people are like, ‘Why the fuck do you sound like My Chemical Romance?’ Ugh!”
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