Lansing, MI · emo · pop-punk

Hot Mulligan

4 upcoming festivals

Midwest emo's chaotic favorites — screamed choruses, absurd song titles, real feelings, and a crowd that knows every word including the yelps.

Hot Mulligan formed in Lansing, Michigan, and built a following through the second half of the 2010s with a sound that pulls together pop-punk hooks, Midwest emo guitar figures and the strained, shouted delivery of vocalist Nathan Sanville. Records including You'll Be Fine and Why Would I Watch expanded the band's audience considerably, helped along by songs that pair tangled, tapping guitar parts with choruses built for group singing.

Lyrically the band tends toward the self-deprecating and the specific, often undercutting bleak subject matter with jokes, and the same instinct shows up in the deliberately unwieldy song titles. Live, the group leans on the volume and the audience's familiarity with every vocal crack.

emopop-punk