The Linda Lindas broke out in 2021, four teenage/pre-teen rockers making the world a less fallen place with every buzzsaw riff they struck. The band went viral that year with their song “Racist, Sexist Boy,” a grunge-punk scorcher inspired by anti-Asian taunts their drummer had been subjected to on the school playground. The band had already been playing for a couple years (including opening a show for feminist-punk icons Bikini Kill that inspired Amy Poehler to include one of their songs in her movie Moxie). But “Racist, Sexist Boy” made them a sensation: They were big-upped by scads of cool musicians, played late-night TV and Coachella, and landed plum openings gigs (this year they’re on the road with Green Day, Smashing Pumpkins, and Rancid). Their 2022 debut, Growing Up — which they’d signed to record before their viral success — proved they were no fluke, with bracingly confident songs full of empathetic rage and precocious wisdom.
Their follow-up, No Obligation, is just as impressive. “We’re so small but we stand tall,” they offer on “Resolution/Revolution.” Guitarists Bela Salazar and Lucia de la Garza, bassist-pianist Eloise Wong, and drummer Mila de la Garza are now between ages 14 and 20. As on their debut, they all sing and write, each contributing to the band’s uniquely affirming mix of emo, pop-punk, and riot-grrrl.
It’s all given a tuneful sheen that suggests the work of a teeming pop-rock hive-mind at work. The brightly stomping “Lose Yourself” sounds like Green Day by way of Blondie. They deliver a pogo-ready diatribe against patriarchal bullshit on the title track, insisting “You’d like me better if I wasn’t a mess/You’d like me better if I’d put on a dress,” and add some glam-metal swagger in with their hardcore blitz on “Excuse Me.” The most surprising swerve is “Yo Mi Estresso,” a tune about feeling stressed out with a mariachi rhythm and none other than “Weird Al” Yankovic on accordion.
Certainly, “Weird Al” wasn’t the only famous person who would’ve leapt at the chance to be on this record — the older act would be getting the co-sign, not the other way around. But more celebrity window dressing would just be useless clutter obscuring the story of personal growth that’s at the heart of No Obligation. The influences they list in the album’s liner notes — from Sleater-Kinney to Jawbreaker to the Yeah Yeah Yeahs to Paramore — have armed them with the emotional language of punk-rock self-discovery, and they wield it just as potently as they wield their guitars.
“Once Upon a Time” and “Nothing Would Change” are nuanced songs about the coherent childhood past fracturing into a messier future. “Don’t Think” starts out sounding like an overtired kid after a long day at an amusement park (“Sometimes things that are fun are not fun to me”) and becomes a critique of being forced to conform to society’s expectations: “They told us don’t be basic/They meant be relatable instead.” Getting overly self-conscious might be a problem for a band experiencing success at such a young age, but the Linda Lindas are too smart to fall into any grown-up’s trap, even as they make the bizarre experience of growing up feel like a riot.
