When Blink-182 released sixth studio album ‘Neighborhoods’ in 2011, numerous people took to YouTube in order to give their takes on the new Blink-182 material, Swedish pop-punk band Future Idiots decided to go a little further than this however and recorded and released an entire cover album in the form of ‘Neighborhoods & Morningwoods’ through Pacific Ridge Records in October 2012, taking on all 13 tracks from the album in a quest to provide a more ‘Enema of the State’ feel about the music. The result is largely pretty pleasing to hear; there are a couple of duds in the mix, this was also true of Blink 182’s ‘Neighborhoods’ album though so I’m sure we can forgive them for this. Also, Future Idiots’ ‘Even If She Falls’ cover is pretty much identical to Blink 182’s version, it was probably my favourite track from the ‘Neighborhoods’ album however so again I think we can forgive Future Idiots for not messing with a track that was already absolutely brilliant.
With the album taking the same course as the original in terms of its tracklisting (albeit without the ‘Hearts All Gone Interlude‘ and with an extra version of ‘Up All Night‘ tacked on the end), ‘Ghost on the Dance Floor’ is up first and sets the tone pretty nicely for what we can expect from the rest of the ‘Neighborhoods & Morningwoods’ cover album. It’s pretty much the same track from the Blink-182 album, the synth has been taken out however and the track has therefore been stripped back to the basics that we know and love from Blink-182. It’s a solid track, and right from the off here you know what to expect from the rest of the release: a similar record, just without the synth sections and Angels & Airwaves influence.
When I first had a look at the tracklisting for the ‘Neighborhoods & Morningwoods’ cover album, I was initially slightly confused that there are two versions of ‘Up All Night’ here. Upon listening to the album I soon discovered that the first version of the track is actually a cover of a cover however, and that the second version is more the Future Idiots take on it. KeezyKabeezy uploaded his take on ‘Up All Night’ back in August 2011, from the perspective of how it might have sounded had it been released in the ‘Enema of the State’ era, and Future Idiots here pay homage to KeezyKabeezy with a cover of his cover. I’m a big fan of KeezyKabeezy’s Blink-182 covers, and his original music such as his track ‘Power Lines’ is actually really good as well, so I was definitely impressed with Future Idiots cover of his version of the song, and I also enjoyed their version of ‘Up All Night’ as well. KeezyKabeezy’s version is definitely a little more different to the original than Future Idiots’ own cover of the track, each cover has its merits however and I can definitely see myself listening to both of these cover versions again in the future.
Future Idiots’ cover of ‘After Midnight’, whilst coming across as a little boring, stays fairly true to the Blink-182 original which could also be accused of being a little on the boring side. Future Idiots do inject a little more energy into the chorus to make it sound a little more like it may have sounded if Blink-182 had released it 10 years earlier, it’s certainly not my favourite cover from the album however, but then again, like I’ve already said, the original ‘After Midnight’ wasn’t really my favourite from the ‘Neighborhoods’ studio album either so I guess it’d be a little much to expect this young pop-punk band from Sweden to achieve with the track what one of the biggest names in the genre were unable to.
‘Wishing Well’ is probably another of Blink-182’s better efforts from the ‘Neighborhoods’ studio album, and Future Idiots definitely do the track justice here with a pop-punk cover that comes across very nicely on record. As is true of a lot of the tracks here, their cover has undergone minor tweaks and alterations to sound a little more ‘Enema’ than ‘Neighborhoods’, largely it is a very similar piece of music however and comes across as a decent cover of a quality Blink-182 song.
‘Love Is Dangerous’ is one cover from this album that I really couldn’t get to grips with. Blink-182’s version of the track, whilst different from what we’ve come to expect from Blink-182 over the years, is actually a track that I really enjoy listening to. Future Idiots’ cover of the track however just doesn’t do it for me; I don’t like the chorus at all, and this is something that I really enjoyed about the Blink-182 version of the track. I can recognise that the attempt is there to try and make the track sound a little more like ‘Cheshire Cat/Dude Ranch’ era Blink-182, for me it doesn’t work out so great however and this is the one and only track from the album that I really couldn’t find much enjoyment in at all.
Unlike some people that somehow see ‘Neighborhoods’ as the weakest album from Blink-182, I personally really like it and feel that there are actually a lot of great tracks to be found on it. Does it bother me then that Future Idiots and others have seen the need to take the album on and give the music more of a classic Blink vibe? No. Each to their own, and I’m always interested to hear other people’s takes on Blink-182’s back catalogue, so for me it’s interesting and fun to hear an entire ‘Neighborhoods’ cover album. There are things that I like about it, things that I dislike about it, and things about the cover album that I’d have done differently if it was me personally that was recording this cover album. I know that certain people have taken Future Idiots’ decision to cover this album as somewhat of an attack on Blink-182, as if Future Idiots have somehow recorded this album from a position of showing Blink-182 how the album ‘should’ have sounded. Personally, I just see it as a young group of musicians listening to this album and reimagining it as a 1999 release from Blink-182 rather than a 2011 release. From listening to this band’s original music it is obvious that Blink-182 is a band that they love and have a lot of respect for, they just perhaps prefer the Blink-182 sound of old as I’m sure a lot of people do, and have released a cover album which takes a nostalgic look at a new album from an old perspective.
If you’re more a fan of Blink-182’s older music than their new approach then I’d definitely recommend taking a listen to Future Idiots’ ‘Neighborhoods and Morningwoods‘ cover album. Even if you are a fan of ‘Neighborhoods‘ as I am then it’s still worth taking a listen to this album and hearing what this Swedish band thinks it might have sounded like had it been released in 1999; it’s interesting to hear their ‘Enema‘ take on the album, and I personally really enjoyed listening to this cover album on the whole, even if there were one or two slightly dodgy offerings on display here. There are some great cover tracks here, and although it’s not all good, there are definitely a lot of positives to be found and ‘Neighborhoods and Morningwoods‘ is a fine ode to one of the best bands in pop-punk.
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UK based film graduate with a huge passion for music, sports and video games.
