When did we agree that Pop Punk would be back and why didn’t I get the memo?

With a beat that seems plucked out of Ska and a music video that will no doubt trigger flashbacks to “Enema Of The State”, the four-piece pop-punk outfit People R Ugly jumps right in front of your face with all their zany and irreverent energy, picking up where the mid-2000s left off as if the past 15 or so years just hadn’t happened at all- Hey I’m down for that! The song comes through their own label “On The One Records” and their partners at Soundcloud as well.

The lineup consists Zak Dossi, Bill Biersy, Julian Delgrosso, and Tristan Kevitch. The South California band has a rather interesting story behind its formation, starting with Drummer Tristan Kevitch quite literally “Emailing every venue in Los Angeles asking to play a show, even without a band or any original songs” until The people at The Whisky A GoGo got back to him with an open spot. A little later, Kevitch would end up linking up with Singer/Songwriter/producer Zak Dossi through Instagram who would later introduce him to artists Bill “Biersy” Biers and Julian Delgrosso. Five days later the impromptu band had sold their first show.

That was a year ago, and since then they’ve been hard at work filling up some top venues around L.A. with the same manic fever-dream energy that they carry over to their music.

To be fair, While this song and music video are very much a work of Pop Punk, the band doesn’t limit themselves to that little corner, and if you pay attention to their sound you’ll catch a few atypical hints here and there that point towards something a bit wider. They happily describe themselves using the catch-all label “Rock“, which I think is surely a better term to use.

Pop-Punk is ever-youthful in its vibe of course, and that’s sort of inherent to the upbeat attitude- but youthful doesn’t mean immature, and it’s clear that these guys are really anything but; at least not when it comes to their musical proposal, which is rock solid and a little bit more complex than what many of their predecessors ever felt, with Dossi’s vocals being a particularly strong point for the band due to the more masculine tone that seems rooted in Rock & Roll, a nice bit of variety that again puts them in contrast to the more boyish singing styles I’ve come to expect from the genre..

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