Hey, remember 2012? What a crazy year, huh? Lots of cool stuff happened in the world of music like that new Propagandhi album and the Beatles playing on the Ed Sullivan Show[citation needed]. But lots of not cool stuff happened too. Below are a few awful trends that need to die right now before they follow us into 2013 like a clingy ex: 

Punk parody shirts

We’ve officially hit our quota on these. We get it. Milo is Heisenberg. The Crimson Ghost is Justin Bieber. The Black Flag bars are photos of John Stamos or whatever. Pretty sure you can just wear a regular ol’ Misfits shirt and be done with it. It won’t be as “ironic,” but you know…people won’t want to punch you in the junk as much.

Cassettes

Releasing three albums in one year

We don’t need three albums in one year. From some bands, we don’t even need one album in three years. …Unless you are Dillinger Four. If you are Dillinger Four, you can put out three albums in one year.

Reunion tours

Guys, it’s over. Once upon a time, your band put out some good records, you played some fun shows, people wore your merch. We all had a good time. But that’s over now. You broke up for a reason and we don’t need you pretending to like your bandmates so you can play some $30+ per ticket reunion shows. And we definitely don’t need you to record a new album that sounds like a watered down version of your former self. …Unless you are Avail. If you are Avail, you can do a reunion tour.

Bringing people back from the dead

Holy lord, whose idea was this trend? This is way worse than reunion tours. It is literally beating a dead horse. Can we let these poor people rest in peace without raping their corpses for a few more dollars? If we see a Joey Ramone hologram this year, we will seriously flip the fuck out.

Social media-ing the shit out of shows

Between uploading videos to YouTube, choosing Instagram filters, checking in on FourSquare, texting your friends the setlist, tweeting some dumb hashtag like #killingit, when do you people have time to actually watch the band you paid to see? Maybe at some point, put your iPhone down so that we don’t have to look at a sea of lit-up screens? Also, if your buddy couldn’t make it to the show, he couldn’t make it. No need to call him and hold your phone towards the speakers for an entire show. It sounds like a garbage truck running over Nick Nolte to him and it looks obnoxious to us.

Alt porn

Nothing against boobs. I think we can all agree that boobs are awesome. But ladies. LADIES. You don’t need to get a chestpiece and post a thousand gratuitous nude photos of yourself to be Internet famous. We’d love you if you were wearing a parka.

This haircut

It’s awful.

“PMA”

“PMA” is the “YOLO” of the hardcore community. It’s a cringe-worthy, cliche phrase used by the lowest common denominator of people. It’s just some bullshit catchphrase you can wear on a t-shirt to let everyone know you’re one of those fashionable hardcore kids who listened exclusively to hip hop before you discovered H2O. It also makes no fucking sense. Positive Mental Attitude? It’s either mental or it’s an attitude. Not both. But hey, #PMA all day, bro.

Throat tattoos

Why even bother trying to explain this better than Rob Delaney? 

Punk chic fashion

Cut this shit out, Hollywood. If any women-punchers are gonna wear punk leather jackets, it’s gonna be Ben Weasel.

Blink 182 / Blink 182 side projects

If you had said in 1997 that in 15 years, we’d still be humoring Mark, Tom, and Travis’ juvenile delinquency into their 40s AND their pretentious side projects, we probably would’ve drank the bottle of bleach we were dying our spikes with.

RMVNG VWLS FRM BND NMS
DNTL, MGMT, RVIVR, THE WEEKND. Not sure why, but it seems like a new one of these pops up every week. One theory is that they’ve cracked some code in Pitchfork’s grading algorithm where taking the vowels out of your band name merits at least an 8.0. 

Ridiculous band merch

Beer koozies, belt buckles, bracelets, baby onesies, flasks. We are bordering on Gene Simmons-level merchandising here. 

Bands that look like this

This. What is this called? On second thought, it doesn’t matter. Let’s just cure the disease before we name it. Actually on third thought, let’s name it. Skittle-core? Anim-emo?

• posted by Dan Ozzi