Emo Nite DJs “honoured” to play Coachella as genre “breaks through” tops US 40 radio airplay

nme.com:

Coachella, and pop punk currently topping pop radio airplay, key players behind the US emo revival spoke to NME about the genre’s recent commercial success.Last year, Olivia Rodrigo’s angsty guitar anthem ‘Good 4 U’ topped Billboard charts while spending six weeks at the top of pop radio.

Machine Gun Kelly’s pop-punk albums ‘Mainstream Sellout’ and ‘Tickets To My Downfall’ both entered the hot 100 charts at Number One, while his 2021 single, ‘My Ex’s Best Friend’ led alternative airplay charts for three weeks, before also peaking at Number Three on pop airplay.Based on the recent pop-punk crossover to top 40 radio, the hashtag ‘emo’ boasting 15.7 billion views on TikTok and counting, and the fresh crop of radio-friendly guitar acts, emo has made a comeback in the US nearly two decades after its emergence.Back in 2014, when Emo Nite cofounders TJ Petracca and Morgan Freed asked if they could take over the aux at a “small dive bar in Echo Park, Los Angeles” they had no idea that choice would eventually land them on stage at one of the world’s largest music festivals.“We just wanted to pick the music and Morgan knew the bartender,” Petracca told NME. “He was like ‘you could come pick the music on a Tuesday night.

Nobody’s coming on this random rainy Tuesday.’”“I plugged in my iPad and started playing songs off Spotify,” he added. “Then we made a Facebook event.

The capacity of the bar was probably 100, and 200 people showed up. The next month we did it again. More people showed up.”A post shared by Emo Nite (@emonitela) They were eventually forced to find a larger venue, moving to the 700-capacity Echoplex down the street.