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Descendents - Milo Goes to College (Full Album) 1982
Label: New Alliance Records – NAR-012
Format:
Vinyl, LP, Album
Country: US
Released: September 4 1982
Genre: Rock
Style: Punk, Hardcore
Descendents - Milo Goes to College (1982)
Outside of poppy first-wave punk bands like the Ramones, The Clash, and the Buzzcocks, there's a good argument to be made that no album had a more profound impact on the development of pop punk than the Descendents' first full-length, 1982's Milo Goes to College. It was firmly rooted in the hardcore scene -- released on the Minutemen's New Alliance Records, produced by SST's in-house producer Spot, and played with the same rawness, speed, and intensity as early Black Flag (who Descendents drummer Bill Stevenson later became a member of) -- but the Descendents added in bright, catchy melodies through Milo Aukerman's bratty, snotty delivery, and basically invented pop punk in the process. And it wasn't just the sound of pop punk that Milo Goes to College paved the way for; it was the lyrical content too. With songs about hating your parents, wanting girls to like you, being a loser, and a hint of social criticism, Milo Goes to College laid out what would be the primary concerns for a large majority of pop punk bands to come. Just about every major pop punk band has sung the Descendents' praises, but one band in particular who took notes directly out of Milo Goes to College's playbook was also the band who brought punk to its widest audience: blink-182. "[Descendents are] the only reason blink-182 existed," Tom DeLonge once said. "It was the first band the three of us all agreed on." Mark Hoppus said they "changed the trajectory of [his] life forever." Even if they didn't say it, just a cursory listen to blink-182's '90s output would make the Descendents' influence very, very clear. When blink covered Milo Goes to College standout "Hope" without changing a single thing about it, it sounded... exactly like a blink-182 song. blink may have introduced this kind of music to more people than ever in the late '90s and early 2000s, but it was the Descendents who created it.
Outside of poppy first-wave punk bands like the Ramones, The Clash, and the Buzzcocks, there's a good argument to be made that no album had a more profound impact on the development of pop punk than the Descendents' first full-length, 1982's Milo Goes to College. It was firmly rooted in the hardcore scene -- released on the Minutemen's New Alliance Records, produced by SST's in-house producer Spot, and played with the same rawness, speed, and intensity as early Black Flag (who Descendents drummer Bill Stevenson later became a member of) -- but the Descendents added in bright, catchy melodies through Milo Aukerman's bratty, snotty delivery, and basically invented pop punk in the process. And it wasn't just the sound of pop punk that Milo Goes to College paved the way for; it was the lyrical content too. With songs about hating your parents, wanting girls to like you, being a loser, and a hint of social criticism, Milo Goes to College laid out what would be the primary concerns for a large majority of pop punk bands to come. Just about every major pop punk band has sung the Descendents' praises, but one band in particular who took notes directly out of Milo Goes to College's playbook was also the band who brought punk to its widest audience: blink-182. "[Descendents are] the only reason blink-182 existed," Tom DeLonge once said. "It was the first band the three of us all agreed on." Mark Hoppus said they "changed the trajectory of [his] life forever." Even if they didn't say it, just a cursory listen to blink-182's '90s output would make the Descendents' influence very, very clear. When blink covered Milo Goes to College standout "Hope" without changing a single thing about it, it sounded... exactly like a blink-182 song. blink may have introduced this kind of music to more people than ever in the late '90s and early 2000s, but it was the Descendents who created it.
