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''Fandom'' (stylized in all caps) is the third studio album by American
pop rock Pop rock (also typeset as pop/rock) is a fusion genre with an emphasis on professional songwriting and recording craft, and less emphasis on attitude than rock music. Originating in the late 1950s as an alternative to normal rock and roll, earl ...
band
Waterparks A water park (or waterpark, water world) is an amusement park that features water play areas such as swimming pools, water slides, splash pads, water playgrounds, and lazy rivers, as well as areas for floating, bathing, swimming, and other baref ...
, released on October 11, 2019. It is the band's only release through
Hopeless Records Hopeless Records is an American independent record label in Van Nuys, California. History Hopeless Records was founded in 1993 by Louis Posen. The label's artists are generally considered to fall under the genres of punk rock, pop punk, post-ha ...
and was produced by Zakk Cervini. The album debuted at number 32 on the ''Billboard'' 200 and number 52 in the UK, spawning six
single Single may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media * Single (music), a song release Songs * "Single" (Natasha Bedingfield song), 2004 * "Single" (New Kids on the Block and Ne-Yo song), 2008 * "Single" (William Wei song), 2016 * "Single", by ...
s: "Turbulent", "Watch What Happens Next", "Dream Boy", " eboot, "High Definition" and "Easy to Hate".


Background

''Fandom'' was originally going to be titled ''Friendly Reminder'', but lead vocalist Awsten Knight decided to delete the files and start over. In speaking about why he deleted the album and started over, Knight stated:


Themes and composition

Musically, ''Fandom'' has been described as pop,
pop rock Pop rock (also typeset as pop/rock) is a fusion genre with an emphasis on professional songwriting and recording craft, and less emphasis on attitude than rock music. Originating in the late 1950s as an alternative to normal rock and roll, earl ...
,
pop punk Pop punk (or punk pop) is a rock music genre that combines elements of punk rock with power pop or pop. It is defined for its emphasis on classic pop songcraft, as well as adolescent and anti-suburbia themes, and is distinguished from other pu ...
,
electropop Electropop is a hybrid music genre combining elements of electronic and pop genres. Writer Hollin Jones has described it as a variant of synth-pop with heavy emphasis on its electronic sound. The genre was developed in the 1980s and saw a re ...
,
electronic Electronic may refer to: *Electronics, the science of how to control electric energy in semiconductor * ''Electronics'' (magazine), a defunct American trade journal *Electronic storage, the storage of data using an electronic device *Electronic co ...
,
emo pop Emo pop (also known as emo pop punk and pop-emo) is a fusion genre combining emo with the melodies of pop punk and/or pop music. Emo pop features a music style with more concise songs and hook-filled choruses. Emo pop began in the 1990s with ban ...
, and
rock Rock most often refers to: * Rock (geology), a naturally occurring solid aggregate of minerals or mineraloids * Rock music, a genre of popular music Rock or Rocks may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * Rock, Caerphilly, a location in Wales ...
, with elements of hip hop,
synth-pop Synth-pop (short for synthesizer pop; also called techno-pop; ) is a subgenre of new wave music that first became prominent in the late 1970s and features the synthesizer as the dominant musical instrument. It was prefigured in the 1960s ...
,
emo Emo is a rock music genre characterized by emotional, often confessional lyrics. It emerged as a style of and hardcore punk from the Washington D.C. hardcore punk scene, where it was known as emotional hardcore or emocore and pioneered b ...
,
emo rap Emo rap is a fusion genre of hip hop and emo music. Originating in the SoundCloud rap scene in the mid-2010s, the genre fuses characteristics of hip hop music, such as beats and rapping, with the lyrical themes, instrumentals, and vocals commo ...
,
alternative pop Alternative rock, or alt-rock, is a category of rock music that emerged from the independent music underground of the 1970s and became widely popular in the 1990s. "Alternative" refers to the genre's distinction from mainstream or commercial ...
,
drum and bass Drum and bass (also written as drum & bass or drum'n'bass and commonly abbreviated as D&B, DnB, or D'n'B) is a genre of electronic dance music characterized by fast breakbeats (typically 165–185 beats per minute) with heavy bass and sub-ba ...
, and
acoustic rock Acoustic music is music that solely or primarily uses instruments that produce sound through acoustic means, as opposed to electric or electronic means. While all music was once acoustic, the retronym "acoustic music" appeared after the adven ...
. Lyrically, the album focuses on fan expectations and pressure. Talking about the album's themes, Wall of Sound stated, "
he album He or HE may refer to: Language * He (pronoun), an English pronoun * He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ * He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets * He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' in ...
goes through stages of having written about the fandom directly and the pressures of being looked up to and the issues that have been noticed...to being about a very hard breakup and mental health struggles that comes with everything in general, as well as the topics being spoken about."


Release

On May 23, 2019, the band released their first single off of their upcoming album, "Turbulent" and announced that they got signed to
Hopeless Records Hopeless Records is an American independent record label in Van Nuys, California. History Hopeless Records was founded in 1993 by Louis Posen. The label's artists are generally considered to fall under the genres of punk rock, pop punk, post-ha ...
. On August 12, 2019, the band released the second single, "Watch What Happens Next" along with a music video and the announcement of the album to be released on October 11, 2019. On August 16, 2019, the band released their third single, "Dream Boy," along with a music video. On September 12, 2019, the fourth single, " eboot was released. On September 25, 2019, they released their fifth single for the album, "High Definition," along with a music video. On October 17, 2019, "Easy to Hate" was released as the sixth single, along with a music video.


Artwork

The artwork for the album features a sliced orange in front of a dark green tiled ledge. It was conceptualized and drafted by Knight before being finalized by illustrator Amber Park.


Reception

''Fandom'' received critical acclaim. In his review, Jack Rogers of ''
Rock Sound ''Rock Sound'' is a British magazine that covers rock music. The magazine aims at being more "underground" and less commercial, while also giving coverage to better-known acts. It generally focuses on pop punk, post-hardcore, metalcore, punk, e ...
'' called the album "one of the year's most fascinating, ferocious and fanatical albums". Jamie MacMillan of ''
Dork Dork is a pejorative term for a person (compare with " dweeb" and "fool"). Dork may also refer to: People * Dork Sahagian, Armenian-American climate scientist Arts, entertainment, and media * ''Dork'' (EP), an album by AFI * ''Dork'' (magaz ...
'' gave the album four stars out of five, describing it as "edgy, exciting, and another nail in the coffin of boring genre restraints", calling it the band's best work to date. Jo Cosgrove of ''Discovered Magazine'' gave the album a rating of 9.5/10, stating that "''Fandom'' is a very fun, very bouncy, party-perfect album. But to the right listeners, a fifteen-track confession on why fame and celebrity isn’t as fun as it looks. Or sounds."


Track listing


Personnel

Credits for ''Fandom'' Waterparks * Awsten Knight – lead vocals, guitar, bass, additional programming, artwork, layout * Geoff Wigington – guitar, vocals * Otto Wood – drums, vocals Additional * De'wayne Jackson – vocals * Lucy Landry – vocals Production * Zakk Cervini – producer, engineer, mastering, mixing * Amber Park – artwork, layout * Jared Poythress – programming * Nik Tretiakov – editing


Charts


References

{{Authority control 2019 albums Waterparks (band) albums Hopeless Records albums