Bowling For Soup

The Texas band’s recording history began before its international breakthrough, but Drunk Enough to Dance in 2002 made the wider identity clear. “Girl All the Bad Guys Want” turned an out-of-reach attraction into a sharply drawn comic scene. The named musical and social details helped locate the narrator, while the melody made the song accessible even to a listener who missed half the references.

The music worked because the performance did not stand too far above its own characters. Reddick could sound amused and defeated at once, with the rest of the band supplying a bright, forceful setting rather than an atmosphere of real menace. The arrangements kept the guitar attack concise. A well-placed pause or a small change in the vocal could create as much movement as another burst of speed.

A Hangover You Don’t Deserve in 2004 widened the audience through “1985”, a version of the SR-71 song, and “Almost”. The first made nostalgia itself the subject, giving an adult character the uncomfortable experience of watching her own youth become a reference point. The humour was immediate, but the song also depended on recognising the feeling behind the exaggeration.

Later albums continued the mixture of self-mockery, everyday observation and carefully built hooks. The durable attraction is the way the band gives an awkward situation enough melody to become enjoyable without pretending the awkwardness has vanished. Bowling for Soup’s records often leave the listener with two things at once: a joke that is easy to remember and a chorus whose emotional usefulness lasts after the joke has become familiar.