I have a confession to make: I don’t like the band Turnstile. Can I still be considered one of the cool kids with that opinion?
Everywhere I turn I feel like everyone is always going on about how good Turnstile is. And look, I’ve never been too big into hardcore and I know I’m incredibly late to the game—the band has been around for over a decade—but when I looked them up on Spotify about a year ago my immediate thought was “eh, this is fine, I guess?”
When I actually saw them live, opening for last year’s Blink 182 tour, I was taken aback. Everyone was so hype that it made me wonder if people had even come to see Blink or if they’d just paid inflated Ticketmaster prices so they could see Turnstile in an arena. As over half the crowd sang along and collectively lost their minds I started thinking “wait, maybe I should like this band. Should I???”
But no matter how hard I tried, I just couldn’t get into it. And honestly, thank God. Not because there’s any issue with their music, but because I feel like I’m a little too old to still be thinking there’s music I should or shouldn’t be listening to.
Back when being PUNK AF was my top priority, I made sure to always publicly listen to the the “right” music. I couldn’t just look like some casual punk fan—it had to look like punk was my life. Day in and day out I listened to the most aggressive and/or political bands and genres—oi punk, crust punk, street punk, with the occasional hardcore and emoviolence1 mixed in. Most of the time I really loved the stuff, but honestly, there were more than a few bands I just pretended to like to look cool (I pretended to like the Dead Kennedys for over a decade).
And don’t get me started on the music I had to pretend to not like! I love really dumb pop punk about teenage boys with broken hearts, I love Christian ska about Jesus, and I really really love Oasis and the song “Wonderwall.” Like, it’s the most basic yet beautiful song in the entire damn world—leave me alone.
Even if you don’t know who Turnstile is or any of the genres I mentioned, there’s no way there wasn’t a band or two that you pretended to like just to impress your friends or some music snobs in your life. And along those same lines, I’m sure you’ve had some music loves that you felt like you had to hide.
I mean, if you can’t relate then kudos to you. But if you can, now’s your time to confess. What bands did you just pretend to love and which were the guilty pleasures you jammed out to in secret?
Pretend to love: The Dead Kennedys. Crass. Practically unlistenable.
Secretly loved: HIT ME BABY (ONE MORE TIME)
I feel the same about Turnstile. It does feel like I'm missing a special component about them, but it just doesn't click. I know many people who love it and it does feel funny to be "left out" of the convo but we like what we like and we shouldn't shame oruselves for it because others like it. Spoken from someone who unabashedly loves Coldplays first two Records. We likes we what we likes!