“Let It Happen” by Jimmy Eat World, Monday, May 30, 2022

Today we revisit Jimmy Eat World's 2007 album, Chase This Light. Over the span of four records, from Clarity to Chase This Light, Jimmy Eat World showed what a band with a driving punk-rock rhythm can do with modern production. Clarity is a cult-favorite record. It shows the early days of Power Pop and Emo. Bleed American shows what happens if you get the energy of MxPx, an articulate voice, and throw in a few sound effects, you get a few pop hits and and some Alt-rock bangers.

GOTTA LOVE HOW IT’S SOMEHOW ALL ON ME. The band's follow up to Bleed American, 2004's darker Futures was somewhat of a departure from the punk rock origins of the band. The titular opening track had a different driving energy than a punk-rock beat. In fact, the songs that follow on Futures don't return to punk until track 6, the first single from the album "Pain." The band's 2001 Bleed American had paved the way for other punk-rockers to enter the spotlight, whether it were The All-American Rejects or a ton of other pop-up pop-punk bands that hit the pop and rock charts in the mid '00s. In 2007, Jimmy Eat World returned to form on Chase This Light, a seemingly more pop-punk record than Futures. The band decided to produce the record themselves, but enlisted Butch Vig as their consultant and credited him as their executive producer. The songs on Chase This Light incorporated influences from '80s rock bands U2 and The Outfield, as well as contemporary acts like The Killers and The Shins. Songs like the second single "Always Be," "Here It Goes," "Dizzy," and today's song "Let It Happen" offered a pop sensibility, mostly absent on Futures. 

TALK, TALKING A LOT. The band's third single, "Let It Happen" wasn't a hit and didn't receive a video like the lead single "Big Casino" and its follow up, "Always Be." Some critics have called Chase This Light gimmicky in its use of stomps, claps, snaps, and other sound effects. Perhaps Chase This Light is a little too poppy for die-hard Jimmy Eat World fans. But Chase This Light is the natural follow up to Bleed American, in which the band had an ear for ballads and pop hooks.  Lyrically, Chase This Light expands upon the themes in the band's earlier work, with reference to politics being messed up in "Electable (Give It Up)" and relationships struggles. Today's song is a somewhat slower-paced song that still has that driving punk rock beat, but with a bit of a sadder guitar wailing added as effect. Many of the songs on Chase This Light come from a place of exasperation which makes many of the lines sarcastic. "All the salt in the world couldn't melt that ice," lead singer Jim Adkins exclaims in "Big Casino." "Jesus, is there someone yet who got their wish?" he breaks down in the climactic bridge of "Dizzy." On today's song, the irony in his voice is a little more subtle, but listen carefully and you know that the relationship is grating, and it's only track 2!

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