"One Week" in the style of Blink-182 is a perfect litmus test for your musical annoyances
While it seems impossible that there are more than a few dozen people around the world who legitimately enjoy listening to Barenaked Ladies’ 1998 single “One Week,” there’s still a lot of love for the snotty pop-punk stylings of Blink-182. Thus, Alex Melton’s recent Barenaked Ladies cover, titled “If Blink 182 Wrote ‘One Week,” offers a sort of litmus test for when, exactly, a song that combines these two influences crosses the line from unremarkable or even enjoyable to the sonic equivalent of having fire ants nest in your ears.
There’s no shortage of Blink-182 covers out there already, but Melton’s decision to invert the usual process and instead channel their essence through one of Barenaked Ladies’ wretchedest tracks creates something unique: A test that determines your tolerance for bouncy pop punk, Barenaked Ladies lyrics, and the intersection of these two polarizing sounds.
A.V. Club editor Randall Colburn, for example, says: “As someone who grew up listening to Blink-182 and has gone full circle from liking to hating to loving ‘One Week,’ I enjoy this flawless mashup.” This may be an outlier, Colburn’s opinion forged in the psychic fires of prolonged, A Clockwork Orange-style exposure to the internet. Most people, we imagine, may be able to put up with either “One Week” or Blink-182, not both at once. A listener could be a fan of Blink and still find themselves recoiling when Melton gets to the “Chinese Chicken” line, say. Or, they may be ambivalent about Barenaked Ladies but feel a sense of mounting annoyance at Melton’s spot-on imitations of Mark Hoppus and Tom DeLonge’s west coast whine. Where each person falls on the Blink-Ladies scale of aggravation is determined by their unique histories and personalities.
Incredibly, it seems that Blink-182 have scientific purposes beyond proving whether or not we’re alone in the universe. By combining them with other aspects of pop culture often viewed as super annoying, subjects can easily determine where their breaking points lie. For another example of this, consider the band’s latest crossover with the Kardashian family. Your feelings about this story will, we believe, help guide you toward a fuller understanding of yourself.
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