I have recently compiled a long list o’ e’ery 2000s nu-metal or alt rock album I will probably e’er review on this blog — ’nough to last several years, mo’ than 60. & o’ all those albums, I promise you: none will be as cringe as this album. Yes, including BrokeNCYDE & Family Force 5, who are all on the list. Arguably Falling in Reverse are mo’ cringe, but they’re too late to be included in this series, so Ronnie Radke’s precious feelings are safe from the venom o’ my keyboard & he’ll have to stick to dressing up as Danthony Phantomtano for Halloween to occupy his time.

Hollywood Undead is not so safe, howe’er. I would joke that all I need to say to close my case is point out that this band started on MySpace, but to MySpace’s credit, they also spawned the ol’ band Drill Queen, — now mostly known as the band who created the Jimstephaniequisition song — who are not nearly as cringe. So instead I will make my case with a different statement: this is a band that combines whiteboy gangster rap & goth emo. ’Course combining hip hop & emo wasn’t that wild by that point: Korn & Linkin Park did it all the time. But Jonathan Davis & Mike Shinota weren’t talking ’bout how they’re gonna point their gun @ yo son.

The album we’ll be looking @ is their debut, Swan Songs. Despite how obviously bad this album is, my rock-bottom standards in my high school years liked it fine. I didn’t go around telling people ’twas my favorite or e’en remember it much beyond the year that I 1st listened to it & ripped a couple songs onto a blank CD ’long with random unrelated songs from CDs I checked out from the library, but I somehow didn’t feel too ashamed to play this music out loud @ places, & nobody shamed me for doing so, ’cause that’s just what music was in the 2000s. E’en I can’t remember how this was e’er allowed to happen, so there is no chance I could explain it to people who weren’t there @ the time, & I don’t think any good could come from younger people understanding this savage relic. But we can get some good laughs out o’ making fun o’ it, so that’s what we’re going to do.

1. Undead

O my god, ¿where do I e’en start with this song? Apparently its music takes Ozzy Osbourne’s “Crazy Train”, but fucks with its notes & makes it computerized & shitty.

This song is a brag rap; but rather than exemplify any actual clever wordplay or multilayered rhyming or paint a believable picture o’ someone who is a legit threat, they mostly sling around the same small #s o’ the same “motherfuckers”, as well as plenty o’ homophobic slurs, ’cause ’twas the noughties, & brag ’bout how they love getting drunk & crash their cars. I’m not kidding: they have a line that goes, “’cause we drunk-drive Cadillacs, we never go far”, implying that their drunk asses crash into a wall just after they start driving.

& if that doesn’t make your peepees shrink in their magnificent presence, a’least a full verse is dedicated to insecurely whining ’bout the haters, ’cause that always makes you look cool. It’s especially badass when it comes with lines like these:

you make me wanna run around pulling my guns out and shit
you’re tempting me to run my mouth and call you out on this, bitch

¡Don’t you dare tempt me to… call you out? & then you call them a bitch, so you’re already calling them out. Too late. Looks like it didn’t take long for you to give into that temptation.

They follow this up by whining ’bout people misinterpreting their lyrics:

¿how ignorant you gotta be to believe any of this?
you need to slit your wrists, get pissed, and go jump off a bridge
what, ¿you can’t see the sarcasm in the verses I spit?

Crackas, this is your 1st album: you don’t have haters yet ’cause nobody knows who the fuck you are. Nobody’s going to slit their wrist ’cause fucking Hollywood Undead told them to.

I should add that the chorus to this hard-edge song has lines like “get up out the way” & “I don’t give a fuck what you think or say”, which surely impressed the 12 year ol’s o’ 2008.

& then J-Dog, with the most generic rap name, comes in with these hard lines:

white boys with tattoos p-pointing right @ you
we’re breaking everything, r-rowdy like a classroom
pack of wolves ’cause we don’t follow the rules
& when you’re running your mouth our razor blades come out

Better watch out, ’cause this rowdy classroom’ll give you a close shave.

Genius claims the song has the following lines:

because there’s nothing in my life except my dick & what I spit
so my dick is in my hand when I respond to faggots talking shit
speaking of fag, already rapped with the drag
we killed him then we stuffed his body in the Cadillac

But I didn’t hear this on either the YouTube Music version o’ this song or the version I ripped off the CD I borrowed from the library way back in 2008, presumably the original release. I could understand why they would want to remove it, as it goes beyond the casual homophobia o’ throwing round slurs @ anyone & e’eryone to specifically talking ’bout carrying out a hate crime gainst someone in drag.

In any case, it’s impossible to take seriously that these clowns could carry out such a crime, anyway, especially when they follow it with these hard-ass lines:

¿so what the fuck you know about being a gangster?
¿& what the fuck you know about being in danger?
you ain’t doing this so you know you’re just talking shit

& in his defense, he’s right: I ain’t making cheesy raps ’bout being a whiteboy gangster & I am talking shit.

Grade: D

2. Sell Your Soul

We follow that hard-ass gangster brag rap with a bizarre mix o’ an emo song, starting with generic piano notes, & a “fuck the haters” anthem as the verses & chorus devolve into shouting & screaming. Like the previous song, the basis for this hate is vague; — beyond I guess the fact that this music is goofy — but unlike that song the way this writer describes it is mo’ detailed & much mo’ melodramatic, with such lines as:

¿how did it come to this? ¿how did I know it was you?
it was a bad dream asphyxiated watch me bleed
the life support was cut the knot was too tight
they push and pull me but they know they’ll never win

&

my heartbeat stumbles & my backbone crumbles
i feel, ¿is it real?, as the lynch mob doubles
they want blood & they’ll kill for it
drain me & they’ll kneel for it
burn me @ the stake met the devil made the deal for it
guillotine dreams, yeah, their guillotine gleams
the blood of their enemies watching while they sentence me
sentencing ceased sentence deceased
& watch them bask in the glory of their holy disease

I don’t get the point o’ this song or what the listener is s’posed to feel — & for as cheesy as most nu-metal is, I understand what pretty much e’ery Thousand Foot Krutch, Skillet, or Papa Roach song is s’posed to evoke int he listener.

Grade: F

3. Everywhere I Go

& then after that emo song ’bout the struggles o’ the hood life we get a song ’bout how they like to show their “weenies” — that’s the word they use — to women in a kind o’ hoedown ’bout how “bitches always know” with a wacky accent & cheap artificial music that sounds like an e’en worse Eminem song off Encore, but without the creativity — yes, I will defend Encore compared to this.

& the lyrics in this song make the previous 2 sound like Eminem in comparison. The 1st line o’ the 1st verse, in a jerky stop-&-go flow:

wake up, grab beer, grab rear, shave beard

We also get some o’ the most forced, & yet also unimaginable, references e’er:

& I’ll punk the pussy like I’m Ashton Kutcher

I’m like Cheech, you got the Chong, hitting up this beer bong

¿Is “the Chong” e’en a real thing? ¿What is the point o’ bringing up Cheech & Chong? You’re not e’en smoking weed; you’re just drinking. ¿You couldn’t e’en do drug as hard as I do?

I’ll be straight: this is the only song so far that I’ve just refused to listen to all the way thru ’cause it’s so intolerable & makes me deathly ’fraid someone somewhere will somehow hear it seep thru the headphones, it’s so embarrassing. E’en while reading thru the lyrics I could only scan them, as they are just humiliating the read. Literally the worst nu-metal song e’er — & yet it somehow merited a music video.

Grade: ☠️

4. No Other Place

See, now this song is actually pretty fun. Gone is the artificial emo shit or try-hard butthurt “fuck the haters” crap. Instead it’s just a song ’bout partying with a decent beat. There are a million better rap songs out there, e’en in that era, which was also a bad time for hiphop as for rock, but with the rock-bottom standards this album gives us, this is a godsend.

’Course, the lyrics are all dumb, specially the chorus, where the singer for some reason feels it necessary to bring up to the woman he’s asking to dance that she “got a fat ass, but you shake it like you ain’t a hoe”. ¿Do hoes not shake well? I would expect that hoes, whose job is to be sexy, should be the best @ shaking.

Grade: C

5. No. 5

This is basically “No Other Place”, but a sillier & lazier. The chorus has the singer in a very high-pitched, squeaky voice squeal, “& all the kids in the hood come on & wave & shake your hands”, which is just as rad as the average chorus line in a Thousand Foot Krutch song, while the lyrics just keep rhyming “drunk” & “fuck” repeatedly, as well as mo’ forced references that come out o’ nowhere to Paris Hilton & Bob Saget. & then the bridge tirelessly lists how all 20 members o’ this band “make the booty drop”. I will give Johnny 3 Tears, as lame as his name is, that he has charisma while rap/singing/whate’er; it’s just too bad they couldn’t get a better lyricist.

Hold on, ¿what are these lyrics, tho?

ladies show me your treats like it’s Halloween
you got a fake id & you’re 17

Genius helps us understand this perplexing pair o’ lines with the following annotation:

Charlie Scene wants to have sex with an underaged girl.

¡Thanks, Genius!

Grade: 🚨

6. Young

O god, now we’re back to the fake emo stuff, & this is the nadir. You know a song’s good when the 1st line o’ the 1st verse is, “i see the children in the rain like the parade before the pain”. Like Simple Plan’s telling these crackers to tone it down. ¿What the fuck is “the parade before the pain”? Also, after the last song I don’t want to hear this band talking ’bout looking @ children.

But during the prechorus they get pumped & angry — ¡they’re raging gainst this vague machine! — as they talk ’bout marching to the drums &… ¿being numb? I’ve ne’er heard someone so aggressive ’bout not feeling anything @ all.

What they’re marching against is, as I said, vague. The only specific line is some rag gainst “medication for the kids with no reason to live”. Clearly a bunch o’ people in costumes marching around is a better cure for suicidal depression than medicine based on peer-reviewed studies.

I really feel the whiplash when we hit this line:

but you take all we are the innocence of our hearts

It’s hard to take seriously the innocence o’ the hearts o’ people who had just gifted us such sentimental lyrics as “everywhere I go bitches always know that Charlie Scene has got a weenie that he loves to show” & “you got a fat ass, but you shake it like you ain’t a hoe”.

& if you didn’t think this song was excruciating ’nough after the 2 verses, the bridge has a children’s choir sing, “till the angels save us all”. I wish they could save me from this song.

Grade: F

7. Black Dahlia

¿Mo’ emo shit? I thought these were s’posed to be badass gangsters. These lyrics are so cliché that they actually talk ’bout how they cut themselves — rhyming “cuts” with “fucked up”, no less — & make constant references to tears being “dried up now” &, my favorite, “these tears are deadly”. ¡O fuck! ¡Don’t fuck with this bro’s tears, dogg! ¡You make ’em want to run around pulling their guns out & shit & calling you out on this bitch!

The verses are rapped in this stilted, jerky 1, 2, 3, 4 meter with the most obvious rhymes:

¿you feel bad? ¿you feel sad? i’m sorry hell no fuck that
it was my heart, it was my life, it was my start, it was your knife
this strife, it dies, this life & these lies
i wish i could’ve quit you, I wish I never missed you
& told you that I loved you every time I fucked you

This last line has the lyricist so desperate to rhyme a word “love” with “fuck” ’cause they couldn’t think o’ any other word that they invented this bizarre scenario where someone regrets not saying, <Remember that I love you, baby>, e’ery time just before ramming his cock into her — ’cause that’s a normal thing to do, not, like, when you meet.

& underneath these tragic lyrics are a generic midi sample that sounds like ’twas rejected by Wesley Willis, with the softest o’ drum beats — mo’ like plastic slaps.

Grade: F

8. This Love, This Hate

OK, now this is just nursery rhyme bullshit, with that obnoxious squeaky “DOO-DOO-DOO-DOO DOO-DOO-DOO” jingle thruout the whole song while the singer sings generic lyrics ’bout being strong & shields & lions & shit with the most grating, nasally voice, specially when saying, “& we got each other’s backs” or in the chorus. What the title “this love, this hate” has to do with this song, by the way, I have no idea.

Fitting this juvenile song are juvenile lyrics that struggle to cobble together words into halfway English sentences to keep its common rhymes:

& we once also had a story too
you can see that good men only come in few

I, too, would say that phrase, “& we once also had a story, too”, ’cause I am also an alien.

Howe’er this song does sum up my feelings for it with these lines:

i don’t wanna live this destiny
it goes on endlessly

Honestly, I think I can’t stand this song e’en mo’ than “Everywhere I Go”, which a’least was somewhat funny & audacious in how bad it is.

Grade: F

9. Bottle And A Gun

After the previous boring whiny songs, this song’s absolute stupidity is much better appreciated, as well as the much better deeper, darker beats — which, granted, just sounds like the level theme to a generic FPS.

The lyrics are, ’course, dumb & repetitive: “Funny Man” telling girls to drop their panties like he did in “No. 5” while bragging ’bout how he “play a bitch like Nintendo”, after which someone helpfully shouts, <¡Zelda!> in the background to remind you o’ what Nintendo makes, & Charlie Scene’s rapping ’bout being drunk & telling women to shake their asses ’gain while giving such killer lines, like telling women to smoke his pole like a Marlboro. Some lines don’t e’en make much sense, like when Funny Man says he’s “sexual like I’m hetero”. ¿Is he implying that LGBTQ+ people aren’t sexual? That’s an interesting inverse o’ the stereotypes that conservatives have gainst them.

On the other hand, the pop culture references are less awkward: the Charlie’s Angels bit a’least felt relevant, albeit obvious, & the line ’bout buying Tom’s soul back from Rupert Murdoch was probably the only legit kinda funny thing they said on this album — albeit it requires knowing ’bout News Corp buying MySpace & Hollywood Undead’s origins on MySpace to get it. Also, Specific Media would do Charlie Scene’s work for him just 3 years later.

That said, these poseurs have the gall to use the line, “Hollywood Undead ain’t nothing to fuck with” stolen straight from Wu-Tang Clan. That’s sacrilege.

The chorus is ridiculous, singing in a soft, soulful croon how they “can show you how to hump without making love”. I am curious ’bout that & what it e’en means, but tragically, tho they claim they can show how to do this, they do not actually do so in this song.

Grade: D

Intermission

Speaking o’ Wu-Tang, I think we’ve all earned a break from this album, so let’s listen to why Wu-Tang Clan are truly nothing to fuck wit:

All right, let’s get back to work.

10. California

This is just “Shitty California Love”. ¿Why would anyone want to listen to this song when that song already does e’erything this song meagerly attempts to do fails? ¿& why do so many people make so many songs ’bout just vaguely California as a whole? California is the most populous state in the US & is the media center o’ the world: it’s not all that impressive that you’re vaguely somewhere in this massive state like e’eryone else involved in media. You might as well make a song representing the entire US @ this point. Nowadays rappers should have to talk ’bout specific territories in California, like LA, San Francisco, or San Diego — or if they want to be exotic, Oakland or Sacramento. It specially looks silly to see these doofuses in their costumes pretending to represent a state that hundreds of other rappers already pretend to represent — & is still represented by St. Tupac, as canonized by the Council o’ Rappers. These crackers couldn’t e’en represent North Dakota.

This is the most generic song on this album full o’ generic songs with generic lyrics that just say stuff just to rhyme, e’en tho the rhymes themselves are so predictable:

horny like a sickness, quickies with the quickness
pussy like it’s business, work it like it’s fitness
listen while I spit this, game at all these bitches
now I’m gonna hit this & fuck it till I’m dickless

None o’ these metric feet have any relevance to each other, & “quickies with the quickness” is both redundant & involves a word like “quickness” that nobody actually uses outside o’ bad songs trying to force a rhyme ’cause it sounds awful.

Grade: F

11. City

O’ all the emo songs — yes, Hollywood Undead’s manic depression has switched back from their manic high o’ fucking bitches back down to their emo crying — this is the best o’ them. Yes, the lyrics are vague & repetitive ’bout making the city burn & repeat the same weird rants ’bout medication as “Young” & the chorus’s soft, soulful croon does not fit talking ’bout acts o’ citywide terrorism @ all & the soft slap drums are annoying. But the verses themselves have some pretty interesting rhythms, specially the 2nd verse, where the singer jumps from rapid shouting to a slower tempo, in an erratic way that fits a song ’bout chaotic terrorism.

That being said, I can’t help but laugh @ the hardcore simping the Genius annotation does:

Considering the tumulus/violent [sic] environment that Hollywood Undead transcended as a result of Swan Songs and Desperate Measures, this is a track resonant with the societal ills that families in Los Angeles face.

These 2 clauses don’t fit together. ¿What “tumulus” & violent environment did Hollywood Undead so-poetically transcend as a result o’ this album, ¿& how would that resonate with regular people’s problems? ¿What problems do Los Angeles citizens face that others don’t?

“City” is pretty metaphoric and self-referential; considering the band’s ascent to fame, they asked if anybody wished to accompany them during their rise, an ascent comparable to arson enactments.

1st, there’s no “pretty metaphoric”: metaphoric is binary — it either is metaphoric or isn’t. 2nd, LOL on “considering the band’s ascent to fame”. Fuck J. Cole’s big 3 — there’s only the big undead. There’s a reason Kendrick was afraid to diss real Gs Hollywood Undead ( tho, as we saw in an earlier song, a’least 1 o’ them apparently likes them 17 like Drake ).

Grade: C

12. The Diary

You’d think I’d go all-in hard on this song, arguably the most emo o’ emo songs on this album, but I’m mo’ mixed. While the opening sad strings are cheesy as hell & the singer singraps his depression like he’s in a rap battle, ending 1 verse with the line, “pour myself a whiskey & go back to sleep, bitch” like he’s emo Jesse Pinkman, the lyrics are mo’ specific & real ’bout depression than some generic tripe ’bout “deadly” tears & shields & lions & shit, talking specifically ’bout bitterness @ a father shared with his mother — tho no detail on why — & what seem to be shout outs to family members. This song e’en ties into the party sex songs, with the line, “& hoes you see hoes you see I’m just in a rut” recontextualizing the singer’s hedonistic partying as an attempt to fill a vacant life in a similar way to Weezer’s ( much better song ) “Tired of Sex”. While repetitive, the repetition works better for this song, since the repetition matches the feeling o’ being “just in a rut”. In essence, it’s an emo song, but it’s a halfway competent 1. If not for the hokey music & the squeaky voice o’ the chorus, I’d go far ’nough to call it full-on good.

Grade: C

13. Pimpin’

& after that raw song o’ deep suicidal depression, we get a song called “Pimpin’”, where the chorus goes, “we ride with gangsters and the pimping’s easy”. This song’s fine. I do kind o’ like the rhythm. ( Yawn ). ¿This album’s still going? This is less generic than “California”, but not by much.

Grade: D

14. Paradise Lost

OK, after that song ’bout gangster pimping now we have a very angsty song ’bout how angry the singer is @ God for — ¿Who fucking knows? ¿What is up with the whiplash on this album? ¿Is it intentional?

God, I’ve tried
¿am I lost in your eyes?

Maybe if you tell God they have a fat ass but they shake it like they ain’t a hoe they’ll give you salvation.

The singing is obnoxious, with the verses having this incessant thudding “augh augh augh augh”, while the chorus is the typically squeaky squeal. Meanwhile, the music is electronic goop. The only notable thing is that the opening notes o’ this song are just straight up stolen from John Carpenter’s Halloween theme, but slowed down. What a great song on which to end the album.

Grade: F

15. Pain

’Cept YouTube Music was nice ’nough to offer me the “Collector’s Edition” with 7 extra tracks. ¡That’s 1.5 times the fun!

This is the same typical screamo shit, with those patented Kroeger-brand emo lyrics:

the next of this youth with their necks through this noose
were told lies like it’s truth and we suspect that it’s you

Yeah, telling “lies like it’s truth” is, indeed, how lying works. Thank you for that clarification that clearly doesn’t just exist to force in a corny rhyme.

The singer then goes on ’bout strapping kids with an AK, which I thought was ’bout how society was making kids into school shooters or something, but Genius thinks it’s ’bout leading kids into the military. See, the problem is that they’ll throw in these short quips ’bout medicine or war, but don’t elaborate on them.

Anyway, later in that verse the singer says he’ll “watch the world die thru crimson eyes”, & then says “I cry, it turns to night” in a monotone voice like he’s telling his mom what flavor o’ TV dinner he wants that night.

Grade: F

Intermission 2

To prove that I don’t hate emo, — I certainly have no room to judge, given that I grew up with Papa “I cut my heart open, I sew myself shut” Roach — just bad emo mixed with whiteboy gangster bullshit, here’s a much, much better emo song called “Pain” as a much needed 2nd break:

16. The Natives

Mo’ midi music, only to add midi guitar during the 2nd verse.

I don’t want to hear this cracker talk ’bout “beef” while singing in such a squeaky voice.

Charlie Scene’s attempts to praise himself in the 2nd verse are adorable: yes, keep telling yourself you take it seriously & that you’ll keep getting props — ¡which are like “permanent high-5”s, dude! — for the rest o’ your lives & that your rhymes are tight — ¡just before a line with an awkward pause @ the end ’cause it wasn’t long ’nough to fit the meter! Maybe ’twas on purpose. A Genius annotation is nice ’nough to explain to the listeners that “‘Tight’ is slang for ‘cool’ or ‘good’”, which should be very helpful for the 80-year-ol’ grandma listening & wanting to know what this hiphippin’ youngfolks be all about in the cabbage patch, daddy-o. This annotation also expresses perplexity @ the description o’ the band as “6 white guys”, when 1 o’ the members is Mexican, apparently oblivious to the fact that there do, in fact, exist Mexican honkeys — & looking @ his profile on the Hollywood Undead Wiki, he does, in fact, appear to be un blanquito.

Grade: D

17. Knife Called Lust

With such a title, ¿would it surprise you to hear it start with electro clown music & then a “¡YEAHT’s GO!”. This belching voice — who is apparently “Shady Jeff”, because there’s no better rap alias than putting a dangerous-sounding adjective before a nerdy name — also nicely helps Deuce sing the latter part, “this love, this hate, is burning me away” with a raspy scream, which goes together with Deuce’s squeaky voice like if Thom Yorke & David Draiman did a duet.

I cannot get o’er how fucking generic these lyrics are. Verse 2 starts with the line, “I’m mad @ the fact that your dad is an addict”. ¿Who talks like that? ¿Is this song from the point o’ view o’ a robot? “Panic” is rhymed with “tragic”; “fuck some girl” is rhymed with “fuck the world”; “choice”, “voice”; “love”, “trust”.

Grade: F

18. The Loss

sick with myself, but I’ve got no one else
so I give it to myself, it’s the only thing that helps
it’s the same thing, this pain thing that keeps me from sleeping
& screaming to God I must be motherfucking dreaming

So, I read the 1st 2 lines &, I’m sorry, when I see “I’ve got no one else” followed by “so I give it to myself”, the only logical assumption is masturbation; but then the 3rd & 4th line talk ’bout some vague pain & screaming @ God, but it’s too late, the image o’ some angry whiteboy jerking it under the sheets has already arrived, unrequested, & any mood for epic drama ’bout nightmares & God has been killed before it could take the stage. This is the problem with lyrics as vague as “give it to myself”.

¿have you ever met a living legend, just a real friend?

Tragically, no one informed J-Dog that nobody calls friends “living legends” — tho we do call speedrunners “fucking legends”.

¿who planned his end & where do I begin? you said it was pretend
& when the bullet went thru it took more than just you
it took 2, it was you, it was me & suddenly

Bitch, you did not just describe your homey’s suicide with these nursery rhymes.

¿how could someone say they’re helpless & then they act so selfish?

O, cool, ’nother “suicidal people are selfish” line. That’s what psychologists always recommend you say to suicidal people: “quit bein’ a selfish-ass bitch & stay alive, bruh”. A’least Thousand Foot Krutch had the excuse that they probably believed in 1 o’ the weird sub-branches o’ Christianity that still thinks suicide is a sin. ¿& haven’t these crackers been spitting rhymes ’bout their own suicide idealization thruout this whole album? ¿Who are they to judge?

¿you thought you found an exit? like I said, let’s end this

this line is the most perplexing on this whole album. you say that suicide is no exit, but then follow by saying, “let’s end this”, which presumes that you have the real “exit”; but these lyrics imply that your friend is already dead. ¿so what are you going to give them after they’re already dead that’s a “real” exit? ¿Are you afraid that their ghost will languish the earth till you finalize some ritual?

I just wanna say goodbye
disappear with no one knowing
I don’t wanna live this lie
smiling to the world unknowing

This is the weirdest call & response song e’er: “Don’t commit suicide: it’s selfish & makes me feel bad & if you were a true friend you wouldn’t give a shit ’bout your bitchy problems & would think o’ how I would suffer”. “No, I think suicide is the answer”. ¡& that’s the final say!

Grade: “¿Who can relate? ¡Whoo!”

19. Bitches

OK, since these are technically just bonus tracks, this time I won’t make fun o’ yet another mood whiplash o’ a song ’bout suicide being followed by a song called “Bitches”, which has the following deep lyrics in its chorus:

bitches I hope you know
I won’t stop till I hit that ho
baby come say hello
& get your drunk ass over here let’s bone

This song has this very generic boop-boop beat with these cheap claps that —

this girl’s 17, now I’m a pedophile

OK, I think we’re done with this song.

By the way, I love Genius’s annotation for this line, which is just a blurry face with the expression I imagine any listener would have hearing this.

Grade: 🚨 🚨 🚨 🚨 🚨

20. The Kids

¡Nope! ¡Scene, you stay the fuck away from those kids! Quit staring @ their “ghetto jeans” & telling them to shake their asses.

& I’m ne’er going to take your song seriously in how rad these kids you’re preying on are when you list MySpace as 1 o’ the hip things they do — presumably ’long with playing with slinkies & collecting pogs & Davy Crockett hats. You might as well list them being fluent in JavaScript & Klingon like Weird Al’s “White & Nerdy”. Nor am I going to take you seriously when you mention beef with someone with the name EvanThomas750, especially when Genius tells me that’s just a sockpuppet account you made up for the lolz, or give shout outs to someone with the MySpace username “Ndlestremofbombs”.

Also, we’ve established that this band is “6 white guys”, ¿so who’s the guy saying, “niggas in shit alley show me where you @”? Genius tells me it’s Deuce, who’s definitely a cracker.

Anyway, this song is the same annoying electrojunk as the rest & I definitely don’t want to hear 1 o’ these guys repeat, “fuck the pain away to make it thru the day” in a song called “The Kids”.

Grade: F

Intermission 3

I know we just have 1 song left, but since I brought up “White & Nerdy”…

21. Circles

We start with some harplike dreamy plinking & 4 lines that are the closest Hollywood Undead has come to serious lyrics that don’t sound hackneyed or embarrassing:

take my hand let’s go
somewhere we can rest our souls
we’ll sit where it’s warm
you say, <look we’re here alone>

OK, so they’re not the most original lines: but compared to lines like, “I’m mad @ the fact that your dad is an addict”, this sounds like Wordsworth.

But then the song devolves into the same generic nursery rhymes o’ “find my purpose”, “everything was so worthless”, “I didn’t deserve this”, “you were perfect”, & comparing this girl to an angel & saying you need a savior & blood &… I’m almost wishing Deuce would go back to telling girls they shake it like they ain’t a hoe.

Grade: F

The last 3 songs are just remixes o’ the “Black Dahlia”, o’ all songs, & I don’t need to review them. They’re all repetitive, o’erproduced electrojunk. We are finally free from the cringe… till next month.