Since the 90s, alternative music has taken over the mainstream. Pop punk and other subgenres have emerged, creating what I find to be the best quality music.

Today, many bands that once started as hard-hitting pop punk groups have become unoriginal and too “pop” to fit their former genres. But this change in genre has given them the popularity and fame that many artists crave.

It is not worth it to sacrifice lyrical quality and instrumentation for success. Bands such as Fall Out Boy and Panic! at the Disco had their own following before they decided to make the switch between pop punk and mainstream pop.

Fall Out Boy started in the suburbs of Chicago and had mainly an underground following until their sophomore album “From Under the Cork Tree.” This created their sound with powerful guitar riffs and angsty lyrics for the following two albums until their hiatus from 2009 to 2013.

The two albums released after 2013 have been overall softer. Everything feels more mainstream pop rock, and it is harder to differentiate songs from one another. Fall Out Boy needs to move back to their original sound to stay creative and avoid being lumped into a genre that they don’t belong in.

Unlike Fall Out Boy’s four constant members, the currently one-man band Panic! at the Disco has changed a lot over the past 13 years, including changes in sound. From pop punk to Beatles-esque to techno, the band has experimented with multiple genres.

The past two albums for only member Brendon Urie have digressed from the original quality. Former guitarist Ryan Ross’s lyrical quality was poetic and full of imagery while the band’s collaborative efforts on the music shown through. “Too Weird to Live, Too Rare to Die” and “Death of a Bachelor” lack the creativity and personal connections that the former three albums contained.

One album should not have needed 12 writers to write one song. Urie and former drummer Spencer Smith wrote all of third album “Vices and Virtues” by themselves after the band split in half, but Urie has become too focused on the quick production rates and theatrics of touring to spend quality time writing lyrics. I’d like to see the band move back to its “Fever” era, but it’s highly unlikely Urie will retract to a genre only used for the first album.

And these are just two examples. Other bands such as All Time Low and lesser known bands like The Hoosiers and The Wombats have put less focus on the music and more focus on molding to the mainstream sound of the industry. It’s disappointing to become fans of these bands now, then look at their former music and realize that they’ve actually devolved and digressed in talent.

Panic! at the Disco’s “Death of a Bachelor” being nominated for Best Rock Album at the Grammys was just an insult to other lesser-known bands who actually fit the genre. True rock music, and its sub genres like pop punk, doesn’t really exist anymore, but hopefully the trends will come back around and revive music back to its better genres.