EP REVIEW: Paperweight - "Green Lotus Blooms"
“Green Lotus Blooms in its entirety is the bright, happy, bubblegum pop punk that I wished I saw at Warped Tour.”
by Jesse Smith
You know when you’re super depressed and it feels like it’s always raining outside so you play Real Friends which is making you more sad and depressed. This is the exact opposite of that. Paperweight’s new EP “Green Lotus Blooms” is the musical equivalent of driving to the beach with your best friends on the one day you’re all off at the same time, with the convertible top down and you have your Titanic Leo moment saying you’re the “king of the world.” I know that was really overly specific, but trust me, you’ll understand. Maybe you’ll understand it more this way. This is the band I wanted at Warped Tour. With this band’s very rapid success so far, I’m sure you know exactly what I’m talking about. But for those who don’t, Let’s dive into this.
Paperweight emerged onto the scene at possibly the best time for any band to ever start a band, the beginning of 2020. As sarcastic as that statement is, as far as first releases go, their song “Waster” did pretty well with the listeners and quickly since then saw a pretty rapid climb in attention. Once things opened again, the band started playing out and having some pretty noticeable achievements in festival performances and sold out shows around the land down unda’. “Green Lotus Blooms” is the quartet’s debut EP and with that in mind, this EP blows away any expectations I had for it. The band sounds like they have been making top quality music for years and are a highly established band.
Paperweight’s artwork for their EP, “Green Lotus Blooms”
“Green Lotus Blooms” starts out with a song called “Pilot” which is a 23 second long ukulele intro that seamlessly transitions to track 2 “Scapegoat.” Not only is it seamless, it’s crafty and interesting. Instead of going right into musically and having the music be seamless, there is a slight pause as the lyrics seem to continue the story. We’re in the same conversation from intro to song only this time we are turning on the distortion and picking the vibe up. “Scapegoat” is the first time we’re hearing which way the band is going to lean on the pop punk scale. Because at first, it could have gone either way, but the sunshine outweighed the rain and we got lovable happy pop punk. Moving onto my favorite track of the EP, “Asteroids! And Where To Find Them.” The decision to bring back the Ukulele was the perfect choice, and sets them apart from the other pop punk bands in the scene. When you have something cool and unique, stick with it. Keeping it catchy, the band has an extreme talent for hooks, like their Australian elders Neck Deep. Saving the fan favorites for last, “Tracks” is the band’s highest streamed single going into the EP, and it’s the way the EP needed to be ended. No cliffhangers, just driving home that catchy chorus one last time before giving the crowd their limelight with a chant, all to triumphantly give us a one liner for the road.
I was watching a video on how a band can stand out in 2022. It covered the major bullet points that everyone knows. Playlistings, Tiktok, persistence and luck. But at the end they said, the way to really stand out is to have banging songs, and banging content. With that logic, I think Paperweight needs more attention. Some of you will call it “generic pop punk” but as I grew in the music industry, generic doesn’t mean everyone is doing it. Nah, it means everyone is TRYING to do it, but only the really good gets the prize. Paperweight has nailed this style of pop punk and I give it another year or two before they are in the big leagues. They’re knocking on the door as we speak, selling out shows and getting their big stage times, but give it time before not only Australia knows who they are.