"2005" by The Academy Is...

By Vic Lambeth

Although it was released on streaming just a couple of weeks ago, Chicago-born pop-punkers The Academy Is… first debuted “2005” for the crowd at their House of Blues show in Boston last November, and while I wasn’t there to hear it, the single’s subsequent release has announced the band’s long-awaited reunion album Almost There with a colorful flourish. Lyrically, the song is more cut-and-dry than the band’s previous complexity, but they lean into it with the tongue-in-cheek line, “might even bring TAI back from the dead, would you look at that?”, referencing their 17-year-long music release dry spell. In terms of musical composition, the song reflects with rose-colored glasses on The Academy’s neon-bright pop-rock sound and washes it clean with a fresh, indie spin, launching them into the present decade. The chorus is endlessly hooky, supplemented by a bouncing rhythm from bass wiz Adam “Sisky Business” Siska, who provides the song with the bone structure it needs to get stuck in my head nearly every other day. A refreshing modern twist on the nostalgic emo sound their fans first fell in love with upon debut, “2005” is all a fan needs to get pumped for an exciting new era of The Academy Is…