18 musicians reveal their guilty pleasure songs—and they aren't ashamed one bit
[Pictured: Alex Gaskarth, Hilary Duff; Photo of Gaskarth by: Grizzlee Martin]
Most musicians say they don’t believe in musical guilty pleasures (in fact, you’ll see that response down below!), but we still managed to get them to name specific artists and songs. And the songs they chose are actual jams; we wouldn’t be ashamed to listen to them, either. Here’s what they had to say.
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CHRIS MOTIONLESS, MOTIONLESS IN WHITE
“I’m not really sure I feel guilty about any of the pleasures that I enjoy, but I’ll probably go with Christina Perri. [She’s] a phenomenal artist, and considering that she has a song in Twilight [Breaking Dawn – Part 1], people might consider that to be a weird, guilty pleasure.”
ALEX GASKARTH, ALL TIME LOW
“I try not to have guilty pleasures when it comes to music, because you know, you like what you like; who cares? But I listen to the Hilary Duff greatest hits record a lot.”
FRANK IERO, FRANK IERO AND THE PATIENCE
“I don’t believe in musical guilty pleasures. Fuck that, man. If you like something, like it, unashamed. And if you don’t, you have no business talking about it.”
KEITH BUCKLEY, EVERY TIME I DIE
“‘Hands To Heaven’ by Breathe: This song was the ‘couple skate’ song played at every roller rink from 1989 to1992. And I’ve said this before on my Twitter, but at 3:08 when David Glasper does that little vocal flourish…chills. I’m right back at a friend’s birthday party working up the courage to kiss Nikki from down the street. I’m also very young in this memory. I don’t want anyone to think the song takes a 37-year-old man back in time and drops him off at a party where he’s trying to kiss an 11-year-old girl. Just want to clear that up.”
NOAH SEBASTIAN, BAD OMENS
“Most of the music I like would be considered a guilty pleasure. I’d say my most guilty pleasure, at least to most people would probably think, is country music. Pretty much all country music is a guilty pleasure in the metal world.”
JOAKIM “JOLLY” KARLSSON, BAD OMENS
“I don’t know if I feel bad about what I like. We are heavily into pop and stuff. It could be anything from, even like, Vanessa Carlton. The one song that always gets to me is the Vanessa Carlton song, ‘A Thousand Miles.’ It’s just her voice and her cuteness. It’s immortal. It’s an immortal banger.”
BRITON BOND, WAGE WAR
[Photo by: Briton Bond/Twitter]
“In this world, I guess, for people that judge us, I’d say country music.”
CODY QUISTAD, WAGE WAR
“It’s not guilty for me at all. I love Florida Georgia Line, and nobody seems to dig that. We listen to a lot of country. We listen to a lot of pop country. That’s probably the thing that everybody in this scene would just be like, ‘What!’”
MARK OSBORNE, MOOSE BLOOD
“I haven’t got any. I just think if you listen to any sort of music and you enjoy it, then it hasn’t got to be a guilty pleasure because you like it for a reason. I love stuff like Boyz II Men, Attila, Backstreet Boys. It’s all subjective. They may class it as a guilty pleasure, but I listen to music because I’m a fan of music and all different types of music, from pop to metal; so I wouldn’t really class anything as a guilty pleasure. I just enjoy it.”
MATHIS ARNELL, THE PLOT IN YOU
“Limp Bizkit.”
JON MESS, DANCE GAVIN DANCE
“I was gonna say Whitney Houston, but I’m not really guilty of that.”
WILL SWAN, DANCE GAVIN DANCE
“Father, maybe, for me. He’s an awful rapper, and everyone hates it when I put him on, but I just like him.”
MATT MINGUS, DANCE GAVIN DANCE
“I still like Dashboard Confessional, but I don’t feel too guilty about it.”
BEN BARLOW, NECK DEEP
“‘Burn’ by Usher. I know that start to finish, and anytime that comes on, [I] will happily vibe out to that song. It’s sick!”
BECKY BLOMFIELD, MILK TEETH
“I don’t see it as a guilty pleasure, but I guess to other people… I really like pop music. I really like the new Selena Gomez song. I have that on repeat all the time. It’s catchy as anything!”
JARET REDDICK, BOWLING FOR SOUP
[Photo by: Jaret Reddick/Twitter]
“I like a lot of country music. I think that would probably surprise, but it would just be that genre in general. I freakin’ love country.”
WILL GOULD, CREEPER
“Cyndi Lauper, that record She’s So Unusual. I love that record to bits; I listen to it all the time. It’s got a great Prince cover on it, that song ‘When You Were Mine.’”
TONY FORESTA, MUNICIPAL WASTE
“Tegan And Sara. I love Tegan And Sara. I think they’re good songwriters; they’re funny; when they play live, they just like make fun of each other! They’re twins, and I have a lot of friends that are twins for some reason, like our bass player Phil; he’s a twin. I know a shitload of twins! It’s really weird. That has nothing to do with why I like the band, though.”
