I don’t know very much about The Jungle Giants. I know they’re from Australia, that people voted for them in the JJJ Hottest 100 poll, and that they make sprightly, sugary, cookie-cutter indie pop. I mean, just listen to “She’s A Riot,” if you can. Sunny guitars, handclaps galore, cliched lyrics and song structure…it is in violation of all proper music snob sensibilities!
Yet somehow I don’t recoil at the sound of it. Instead I find myself…playing air guitar? Bobbing my head? Dancing around my room in my underwear like I’m in high school rocking out to Fall Out Boy? What the fuck, man? Has there just been such a dearth of musical junk food in my life that this song only sounds as pleasing as it does to me? Or did I just stumble upon this song first out of the vast mire of generic radio-ready pop songs, when I could have fallen for any of them just as easily? Sadly, I believe the latter.
The problematic thing about “She’s A Riot” is that upon one listen, I know right away that it is the only Jungle Giants song I will ever need in my life. I don’t want to know when their debut album is coming out, I don’t want to know where they’re stopping on their tour, I don’t even want to know the names of the band members, because I know that even if I learn everything about this band and hear every song they’ve done, none of it would compare to the guilty pleasure I derive from “She’s A Riot.” Because fuck it, I love this song, even if trying to justify it would be like 17-year-old me trying to justify Fall Out Boy. I’ll even bet that I’ll be completely over it by the end of the year, but I’ll be damned if I’m not going to make the most of this brief musical fling.
