If you were online at all in summer of 2019, you probably heard the song “Are You Bored Yet?” in the background of saturated, bright summer videos of the VSCO girl era of TikTok. The song became a breakout for its creators, the band Wallows. Part of the song’s success came from its Clairo feature who at the time (and still is) one of the biggest indie alternative artists in the game. But, despite having their breakout in 2019, the band has continued a steady career with the releases of three total LPs, two EPs, and numerous singles that touch on a theme central to the college experience: coming of age and growing pains.
2017
Despite what their Spotify suggests, Wallows was creating music long before their first release “Pleaser” in 2017, as its members Dylan Minnette, Braeden Lemasters, and Cole Preston are childhood friends and have been creating music together before Wallows. You might recognize Dylan Minnette from his acting in projects like 13 Reasons Why and Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible No Good Very Bad Day. The latter’s soundtrack included the song “Surf Surf Don’t Drown” by their former moniker The Narwhals (which you can still listen to on Spotify)! Their 2017 rebrand to Wallows was supported by the further releases of their songs “Sun Tan,” “Uncomfortable,” and “Pulling Leaves Off Trees.”
Personal standouts from this era: “Sun Tan,” “Uncomfortable,” “Pleaser,”
2018
By 2018, the band released their first EP, Spring EP. The tracklist included six new tracks: “Ground,” “It’s Only Right,” “Let the Sun In,” “These Days,” “1980s Horror Film,” and “Pictures of Girls.” To end the year, they released the singles “Underneath the Streetlights in the Winter Outside Your House,” “1980s Horror Film II” (which is a more upbeat and synth-heavy version of the original, and the one I prefer more), and “Drunk on Halloween.” The EP solidifies the first “era” of Wallows’ sound as a cornerstone of their discography and is filled with some of their most overlooked gems, in my opinion. Early lyricism from their first singles and their first EP show that growth and age are themes that will consistently reoccur in the band’s work.
Personal standouts from this era: “Ground,” “Let the Sun In,” “These Days,” “Pictures of Girls,” “1980s Horror Film II”
2019
2019 was a big year for the band with the release of their first album Nothing Happens, which is an incredibly strong debut with a clear thematic core that is supported by innovative, fresh sounds. The songs reference each other in their lyrics — which they also do on their second LP — and past songs. “Ice Cold Pool,” for example, has lyrics from “Underneath the Streetlights in the Winter Outside Your House” in it. The biggest theme in Nothing Happens is growing up and coming of age, which is exemplified best in the album’s closing track “Do Not Wait,” which is framed to be a conversation between Minnette’s teenage and early twenties selves. This centric coming of age theme tracks with the heavy presence of this theme in movies and shows of that same era. The late 2010s saw the release of now-iconic coming of age movies like Lady Bird, Booksmart, and The Edge of Seventeen. The release and subsequent popularity of Nothing Happens rounds out a decade of coming-of-age dominating media, likely due to its depiction of growing pains and the effects of an increasingly digitizing and changing social landscape on adolescents and their coming of age experiences. Although this is not a new genre or theme in media, Wallows’ “birth” came at the tail end of a massive wave of popularity for the coming of age genre in the mainstream, and with the popularity of 2010s bedroom pop. With Nothing Happens, the band solidified themselves as a mainstream indie act alongside viral sensations and fan favorites like Clairo, beabadoobee, and even Mac Demarco. Following Nothing Happens, the band released singles “Trust Fall / Just Like a Movie” in 2019, before taking a brief break.
Personal standouts from the Nothing Happens era: “Sidelines,” “Scrawny,” “Ice Cold Pool,” “What You Like,” “Remember When,” “I’m Full,” “Do Not Wait,” “Just Like a Movie,” “Bad Remake”
2020-2022
After Nothing Happens, the band released their EP Remote during the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic (named so because production was done remotely), and the single “OK,” before releasing their second LP Tell Me That It’s Over (TMTIO) in 2022. They followed TMTIO with a world tour, which I attended! The energy of their show was so fun and I could not recommend their show enough! As an album, Tell Me That It’s Over still sounds like Wallows, but it has a slightly more mature sound, which makes it feel like a new “era” of the band. The central theme to TMTIO is still loss, this time not of innocence or youth, but rather loss of someone or something in a relationship. This is a theme found in a lot of Wallows songs from this point onward, and TMTIO even featured vocals from Dylan Minnette’s girlfriend at the time, Lydia Night of the band The Regrettes, on “Permanent Price.” Not long after TMTIO, Minnette and Night broke up. So maybe, TMTIO was the Wallows version of Taylor Swift’s Midnights, which is rumored to be her “break down, break up” album about her relationship with Joe Alwyn. Both TMTIO and Midnights share the features of coming out prior to the significant breakups and featured contributions from its creators’ significant others.
Personal standouts from Remote and Tell Me That It’s Over era: “Virtual Aerobics,” “Nobody Gets Me (Like You),” “Talk Like That,” “On Time,” “OK,” “Quarterback,” “Coastlines,” “Hard to Believe,” “I Don’t Want to Talk,” “Especially You,” “Marvelous,” “Hurts Me,” “That’s What I Get,” “Guitar Romantic Search Adventure”
Special shoutout: “Marvelous (Cole’s Remix)”
2024-Present
After TMTIO, the band has released their third LP, Model. To me, Model combines early Spring Wallows with TMTIO, whilst introducing a new era for the band. The thematic center of Model is not a stark departure from the themes of Nothing Happens and Tell Me That It’s Over but it has, again, a more mature sound and core to it. On this record, the band emphasizes personal growth, new relationships, and loss, which reflects the aforementioned personal events in the members’ lives, specifically Minnette’s. Additionally, Model introduces some more optimistic outlooks for the future, which brings it back to a central Wallows theme of growth. Most recently, the band is continuing their world tour supporting Model and announced a new EP More coming out Mar. 8, featuring the single “Your New Favorite Song.”
Personal standouts from Model: “Anytime, Always,” “Calling After Me,” “Bad Dream,” “A Warning,” “I Wouldn’t Mind,” “You (Show Me Where My Days Went),” “Going Under,” “Only Ecstasy”
If you want to find the perfect coming-of-age movie worthy soundtrack for your college experience with fresh sounds and catchy lyrics, look no further than Wallows, and use this article as a guide to begin your listening journey!