All Washed Up

Cheap Trick

EB

My first introduction to Cheap Trick was in the intro sequence of Rock Band 2 for PS3. Panning up from a desert street race, two trucks face one another, carrying two bands atop. A poorly rendered bald man swings a flail attached to his microphone, grasping onto the other bands’ car. After a bit of blurry back and forth, the sequence ends with the two cars flying through the back of a billboard. Cheap Trick’s 2025 “All Washed Up” feels like if, after slamming into that billboard, the two cars slowed to an appropriate speed and hugged it out—it’s still punchy, guitar-heavy popish rock, but I won’t hesitate in saying that Cheap Trick are most definitely past their prime as artists.

The album art is almost as important to me as the work itself—setting a tone for the entire listening experience. I had doubts immediately after seeing a quite “AI-looking” block of text. Turns out it was just poorly done. Phew!

The music itself seemed self-aware of its genericness, and while not unenjoyable, Cheap Trick walked a line between embracing this tone and trying to prove that it wasn’t. Individual songs were decent enough to add some power-pop playlists: “Twelve Gates” is great, “Wham Boom Bang” and the first bit of “Bad Blood” really pay homage to their slower works. “The Riff That Won’t Quit” is genuinely an embarrassing track. It ends with “Wham Boom Bang,” which has some beautiful clarinet accompaniments, but whose lyrics bored me to death (a pretty constant shortcoming from this album). Overall, all I took away from this album is a solidified belief in the pleasantries of a quippy bit of clarinet. Maybe prioritize a listen to The Cure’s comeback album over this one!