Sweet (Pink Vinyl) (Import)

Recorded with longtime producers Zack Odom and Kenneth Mount, Sweet marks Mayday Parade’s first album since 2021’s What It Means To Fall Apart as well as the first self-released collection the band – Derek Sanders, drummer/vocalist Jake Bundrick, guitarists Alex Garcia and Brooks Betts and bassist/vocalist Jeremy Lenzo – has released since they followed the Vans Warped Tour in 2006, selling tens of thousands of copies of their Tales Told By Dead Friends EP in parking lots from coast to coast and building their audience one fan at a time.

Across its eight songs, Sweet succinctly showcases just how far Mayday Parade has come in those years: The trademark sound that’s transformed them from genre newcomers to torchbearers for a new generation is still there, the same one that put them on the covers of Alternative Press and Rock Sound and stages around the world including Sad Summer Festival, Warped Tour, When We Were Young, Slam Dunk and Riot Fest.

But fans will also find the band continuing to nudge the edges of their sound outward, whether they’re stomping through reflective alt-rock ('Who We Are'), crafting wryly sardonic pop-punk ('Who’s Laughing Now,' featuring Knuckle Puck’s Joe Taylor), standing up shimmering arena rock ('Natural'), or melding muscular, grungy guitars with electro-pop sweetness (pre-release single 'Pretty Good To Feel Something,' which the band brought to tens of thousands of listeners across the country as headliners on Sad Summer 2024).