Come hang out on Twitch! www.twitch.tv/finnmckenty

As an European, I can explain : if you except GB, english is not our native language. Our tolerance towards "not that good" bands is hugely based on the fact that we dont care about the lyrics that much. I'll gladly admit that it took me years to find out that The Offspring or Good Charlotte were so corny. And the other thing you have to keep in mind : we are not used to see a lot of those bands, we cant just go to a random US festival and see international superstars, so when they do come, yeah, we make it a big deal. Even in France we dont get to see huge UK bands that much, at least at their peak, like AA or BMTH. So yeah, we settle for Escape The Fate or Bad Omens. Finally, when the big bands are huge in the US, they rarely come for more than a couple shows in our continent, so yeah, we pay to see Hollywood Undead in 2018. But that doesnt mean a lot of us are not well aware of what we paid for.

MxPx is one of those bands that never got mainstream success but has influenced a ton of artists that have come after

"This song is 10 years old isn't that terrifying" the fact A Day To Remember is almost TWENTY years old is insane

I would think Millencolin could tour in Europe seeing how they are from Europe.

Sum 41 has a lot more metal influential stuff than pop punk stuff, they’re great

i'm an unapologetic fan of MxPx. "Life in General" and "Slowly Goin The Way Of The Buffalo" are incredible pop-punk albums. Also, my skate/pop-punk band that i played drums in opened a show for them back in 2000 or 01. that was probably the highlight of our whole career and i'm not even mad a bit about that.

MXPX was one of my favorite bands growing up. They got me into punk and broadened my horizons.

I like how those tier lists are thought out whereas I would only rank by how much I like them.

Millencolin's Pennybridge Pioneers is one of my all time favorite pop punk albums so just for that album I'd put them higher.

As a massive Millencolin fan let me add a few thoughts: some of those things you said were true, yes! They were big in Europe (and Australia where I am from). They got big from Tony Hawk soundtracks. Their early music was pretty basic. Though I feel like they really hit their straps in the 2000's which you didn't comment on. I think their 90's stuff was fun, but immature and poorly produced. Pennybridge Pioneers and Kingwood were both awesome albums imo.

The thing about Mxpx is that they actually did come from a DIY scene in Bremerton, WA. Listening to podcasts with Mike Herrera (singer, bassist), Washington had some really archaic drinking laws so anybody under 21 couldn’t really go into bars and venues where shows were happening. So when they were coming up in the early 90’s, they had to improvise by putting on shows at VFW halls, Boy Scout halls, churches, etc. just to be able to play anywhere. They’re also pretty chill with bands I never would have imagined they would have been, like Anti-Flag, Descendents/All, Sick of it All, The Suicide Machines, Goldfinger (Mike plays bass for them), Blink-182, Nofx (they covered Franco-Un American a few years back with updated lyrics reflecting what’s been going on), Less than Jake, The Movie Life, NFG, Circa Survive, Slick Shoes, and many others. They’ve gotten away from the Christian scene, and they’ve been DIY for a number of years now.

As an "not that picky" European kid in the 2000's, Sum 41 as to be S tier. They were the biggest pop punk band after Blink and over Good Charlotte and The Offspring.

Screeching Weasel is S+ Tier

i loved millencolin in high school (penguins and polar bears especially). i found they had quite a specific sound

The best thing about skatepunk is how it does all sound the same and generic. Thats why i love it so much. You know exactly what you're getting 😅

Glad to see the Pokinatcha punk. I was growing up in Bremerton/Silverdale in the mid 90s at the same time MxPx was in Central Kitsap so they'll always have a special place in my heart. It was awesome to watch them go from a local high school band to what they are today. Great to see Mike is part of Goldfinger now too.

Obviously, this is your list and I respect that but I would like to make one point in Screeching Weasel's defense. Both Mark and Tom of Blink have mentioned them as one of their biggest influences. Mike Dirnt has mentioned that as one of his favorite bands. I mean, if the cream of the crop in the pop punk world says they're an influence on them, I'm not sure F tier is fair. Blink even covered one of their songs on the Buddha record. Which, I believe but could be wrong, is the only cover they ever recorded on one of their albums as opposed to a "punk goes..." compilation.

Screeching Weasel is still my all time favorite band.

Great video. With MxPx, if you (not Finn, just anyone) separate them in your mind from being connected to the Christian music industry and just listen to their records… they put out so many great songs, and are still going today. They’ve definitely earned a spot up with the best of them.

This is missing a lot of bands that I thought would have been mentioned, so I'm definitely curious for pt.2. A few that come to mind are: Fall Out Boy, The Academy Is..., The Ataris, Saves the Day, Say Anything, Good Charlotte, NFG, Relient K, Paramore, Sugarcult, Simple Plan, Yellowcard.

MXPX “life in general” and NOFX “punk in drublic”

Regardless of your feelings on the singer of screeching weasel. Which I totally get. I'm pretty sure Tom delonge said their record "My Brain Hurts" was one their main influence while writing dude ranch. They deserve a higher rating for influence. Green days bass player played on one of their records and highly influenced green days sound.

Ramones to me is the top pop punk band ever they started it all

Weasel was doing late 90s/early 00s pop punk in the 80s, dude. They're C tier for me.

There's a good reason mediocre pop-punk bands did decently in Europe*. The scenes were much smaller, and this means that there was probably very little local competition in the genre. People in Germany aren't going to listen to a pop-punk band singing in Spanish, which limits things even more. Wikipedia lists the USA as having around 350 pop-punk bands. The UK lists 11. France has 4. If you liked pop-punk, US bands were the only option. * let's not forget The Ramones had to come to Europe to find any kind of success too. In general I think pop-punk struggled in Europe overall because of the look - guys in their early 20s in knee length shorts, wearing baseball caps backwards, and sounding kind of whiny - it's like an embodiment of negative American youth stereotypes.

Mike from mxpx is very humble really nice dude to everyone

I really don’t think I realized how much being from Cleveland shaped my love for pop punk and metalcore with the massive amount of bands that were from Ohio.

I enjoy hearing a Finn Mckenty opinion

Your thoughts on Pennywise makes me sad… I get it. But I think you have too easily dismissed them. They did bring something original (IMO) to the genre, originally, they just could never truly evolve it and you ended up with the one long song feeling. Thanks for the vids all the same!

Great video, although I was kinda shocked to not see Green Day. I’ve always thought of Blink and Green Day as the two big pop punk legends as far as commercial success and being influential. I probably would’ve included Rancid too, although I guess maybe people don’t see them as pop. Nofx was always my favorite from that scene. That was a fun video.

Keep doing these pop punk videos, love it. I was in one of the tiny unknown bands from the early 2000s, we got to tour with a couple of these bands and crossed paths with some others.... so this is pure nostalgia for me!

dude my mind is blown that 5SOS still has 18 MILLION monthly listeners on spotify...6 million more than Blink-182

90s skate punk is by far my favorite pop punk era. Strung out, pennywise, bad religion, among others.

Let's pull out those Airwalks, tube socks, and Tito Ortiz flame trunks and try to make Pop Punk's new style

As a teen I loved the fact that Pennywise was so consistent with their sound. And I would hate everytime they would try to reinvent themselves, like when they started using double vocals and did an accoustic song. It was a silly extremism, but hey, it made stick with them while abandoning other bands that were trying to evolve.

That was fun to watch. Thanks Finn!

Glad to see FenixTx talked about. They had chances and it just never took. All My Fault was a TRL song and Phoebe Cates was in one of the American Pie movies. Oh well… still a solid band.

“ I don’t like the descendents..” :( “I love the descendents” :D

The Millencolin disrespect got me heated lol

Fun fact: Bowling for Soup vocalist does all the in-house songs for Chuck E Cheese

I think The Story So Far will always remain an S tier pop punk band for me. The lyrics, voice, instrumental, and pure dedication for their music is what made me fall in love with them. I don’t hate a single song from them. Definitely in my bucket list to see them live once

phenomenal list! Love the mxpx love!

It's about time we get your opinions! I died laughing during your Screeching Weasel part. I've always felt the same and I didn't know why. Now I do.

Don’t forget that after a break, 5 Seconds of Summer had that huge song “Youngblood” in 2018. I feel like for the next couple of years, it was popping up in the background at restaurants and stuff. They transcended the teen girl audience, at least temporarily. I wouldn’t say the song was good, though. I prefer the Bilmuri and Lauren Babic version.

Please do a part two! I really, really, really hope to see Alkaline Trio there. I'm very curious to hear what you think about them Finn!

As someone who’s been into Pop Punk since childhood but somehow never managed to hear an MXPX song until my mid-20s, I’m blown away to hear they weren’t popular and not liked. Been sweeping through their albums and finding nonstop bangers that I regret not listening to earlier. I’d consider them A-tier.

Love all the videos Dude!!!

I'm on the go right now so I'll admit I skipped until I saw you talk about Sum 41, with the intention of watching the rest when I can. Really really solid and well-thought-out take there, and as a super-biased Sums fan, I think your assessment was totally fair.

"So Long & Thanks For All The Shoes..." such a slept on NOFX album by most people I know. Such a great album. Guitar tones sounded so angry without being drop tuned. Drums sounded great, bass sounded clean & tasty... ah, love it.

In 05 my band was booked on the triple crown records stage on warped tour for 1 date. There were problems with the generator and the stage started a few hours late so triple crown wanted to cut the bands that weren't signed to them. Folly cut their set and so did hit the lights. They even swapped spots with us and let us take the second half of their set so we wouldn't get cut. Such an unbelievable thing to do. We knew folly but we'd never met hit the lights. Amazing people.

I grew up on all these bands! NOFX, Descendants, Blink etc. Great vid....lil rough on Millencolin for mine, but loved seein all these bands

Big up for making this video. For the most part agree with your tier list. Also good to see someone who is fan of pop punk actually heard of new and old bands. There’s some posers on KZfaq that claim to love pop punk but never heard of bands before modern pop punk era and Blink.

I saw MxPx live when I was 11 years old playing in a church with the OC Supertones to like 50 kids. I'm 37 now. My sister cooked em dinner. My useless fact.

What about The Dead Milkmen, Violent Femmes, Lagwagon, No Use for a Name, Less than Jake. There I'll be that guy! lol

Screeching Weasel was one of my favorite bands in college, and I still love most of their stuff. But you're pretty spot-on about their fans and that whole Ramones-core (or Raclones) scene.

I loved Pennywise, but pennywise shows were rough because the crowd. The crowd were a bunch of a little bit older, drunk , and shirtless guys that just brought the experience down a couple notches. The same guys were also at the Stungout and Bigwig shows

Hit the Lights were an interesting case. A lot of my friends that turned their noses up at bands that had very similar looks and presentation to Hit The Lights absolutely loved them. It's a bit reductive but there was a bit of a split in terms of the genders of fandoms of different bands in that era. It felt like Hit the Lights presented themselves like a band that would've been more popular with girls(bands where the guys had hair like Alex from All Time Low) but I remember my guy friends being the ones who were the most into them.

Bloodhound Gang is a great example of a band that's huge in Europe.

I’ve listened to Milo Goes to College front to back countless times and it’s one of those albums that never gets old

Hey thanks for educating me bout 2004-2012 pop punk. I played in a skate punk until 2004, got burnt out from show after show of baaaad pop punk and totally dropped out of it for awhile. Keep up the content, learned about some rad new bands

OMG you are so right about Sum41, Ioved them but EVERYONE hated on them back in the day! When Chuck came out with that heavier metal sound they really broke away from the pop punk mould and that record was awesome.

NOFX really are that good. How many punk bands can say they never signed to a major label, did everything themselves, sold millions of records, are one of the most influential punk bands, and over 30 years later are still together and still releasing good albums regularly?

Can't wait for part two to see who else you put in the B to E tier. I know Green Day, Good Charlotte, New Found Glory and Simple Plan are coming, but I wonder what other bands might crop up that I've never heard of before.

The big four of pop punk is Blink, Green Day, NFG, and sum 41

I bought that Hit The Lights record SPECIFICALLY because that album art.

Alkaline Trio is still my favorite.

So glad you included Slick Shoes!

Dude!! This was the best content you've put out recently! Don't forget your roots!

Great video finn, I'm as sure as I've got a crack in my arse that someone will get upset you're classing pennywise, millencolin (who yes do very well in the uk and mainland Europe because we actually get to see them more than once every never 😂) and nofx as pop punk 😂

I freaked the fuck out when Descendents got back together in the mid 90s Real cool time

I lived in Lima, OH and worked for Omar’s mom. Omar went from Hit the Lights to a producer at a small studio in Lima.

Bowling for soup above Neck Deep is hard to stomach but love these videos!

My favorite moment in this stream that didn't make the edit: Finn laughing at my comment (It made my whole week lol) "Fat Mike won a silver medal at the Asshole Olympics the year Jello Biafra showed up".

Pennywise is the best band of the 90's skate/pop punk band in my opinion. That's the beauty of music, opinions can be so different and nobody is wrong. Respect putting them on A list and not being a fan

Definitely need a part two. With the first tier as reference

Thanks for uploading

I think Screeching Weasel deserves a little more credit for their influence, especially with all the guitar melodies on top of the rhythm guitars that other bands copied. I would put them above The Queers as far as "Ramones-core" goes. Would have been nice to see Face to Face or Crimpshrine on this list. Descendents definitely deserve to be at the top.

Made my day seeing Descendents in S tier 😁😁🤘🏻

Can’t wait for part 2!!

Looking forward to part 2 - Requesting: Bouncing Souls, One Man Army, Swinging Utters, Pulley

I like the fact that MXPX never had big commercial success and they had 2 albums out when I was in High School. I graduated in 1997! They were on a small label-Tooth and Nail and they have always done things their way. The early stuff is the best. Of course Blink is amazing! SUM 41 is amazing. Fun fact - Derek Whibley sings on the While She Sleeps new track "No Defeat for the Brave". Song is the tits!

Fun facts about jarret the lead singer of bowling for soup. He is currently the voice of chucky cheese and wrote their theme. Also wrote the theme song for phineas and ferb.

I'd love to see a part 2 including Motion City Soundtrack

Hey Finn, What is your opinion of the Vindictives? I feel like they could fit in with the pop punk tier list.

All and face to face are also amazing punk bands, definitely worthy of A/S tier 🤌🏽

Great video. Surprisingly, a lot of the bands I loved haven’t shown up in any of your videos. Well, some have been mentioned off the cuff. Maybe they’re trash. Or too small. What do I know about good music. But I’m just gonna put a list and hope I see a few over the coming months and years. Mest Zebrahead The Ataris Flogging Molly LIT Me First and the Gimme Gimmes H2O Gob Brand New Lucky Boys Confusion (my favorite band ever. Everyone check them out. Throwing the Game album especially) Allister Finch Motion City Soundtrack Unwritten Law Letterkills (Lights Out, original version, top 5 for me) Starting Line Yellowcard Senses Fail (early Senses Fail) Rufio I’m probably forgetting more than I’ve listed. But if a few people get turned on to some they see, then I’m happy. Thanks for your videos.

When I heard "Upside Down" by The Story So Far, it reminded me of this band called "Sherwood" who played Tom's Myspace profile song.

Ahahahahahah i loved what you said about screeching weasel, so fucking funny! I'm from Portugal, Millencolin was my first punk band it was love at first sight!

Not sure if ramonescore is a term used to describe bands that sound similar, but if that's the case, then I would see that as a compliment. I mean, having bands that can recreate those kind of up tempo catchy songs with a slight edge is awesome. Screeching Weasel have a few songs that I absolutely love, more than any GD song. Also, for any people who want to outright banish BW they should also apply the same standard to the shitty behavior of other artists like David Bowie, Drake, Hayley Williams, etc.

I loved Millencolin lol No cigar was one of the first punk songs I got onto. They were on the Epitaph compilations punkorama

*puts Bowling For Soup and SR-71 in the same genre* The “who wrote 1985?” drama is REAL

Finn, I’ve never seen a video where you mention the Muffs. What category would you put them in if not Pop Punk, and what is your opinion of them? RIP Kim Shattuck.

We need some Unwritten Law on that list. Their self titled album is fire from start to finish. There’s not one track that I dislike.

Oh, man! I LOVE TSSF's album Under Dirt and Soil! The best tracks off the album imo are Quicksand, Mt. Diablo, Placeholder, and Closure. I hope Fall Out Boy makes an appearance in part 2. Sugar We're Going Down is a banger!

I can't wait for part 2!

Can't wait for pt2!

I saw Fenix TX with Blindside and P.O.D. on the Satellite tour. Watching them hit a blunt in front of all those youth groups in 2001 was something special.

I, too, would ask you’d give the latest Slick Shoes album ‘Rotation & Frequency’ and their Live Record a listen before you settle your mind upon where they stand in the rankings. Sure, they began as an MxPx-ey speed skate knockoff band but they have far evolved. That. Is. All.

I agree with the D tier bands assessment. I am at the point where I really enjoy finding bands from my heyday (I'm 32) that I had never checked out that got overlooked and are actually pretty good. It is a super comfy feeling, as they have a sound I like and they are new to me.