LOS ANGELES — The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced that 27-year-old Timothée Chalamet will be honored with a Lifetime Achievement Award at this year’s Oscars ceremony in an effort to engage the Gen Z audience, confirmed sources who thought it was about time that happened.
“It was an extremely close call between Timothée, Zendaya, and 20-year-old Jenna Ortega,” said Bill Kramer, CEO of the Academy. “We did a recent tally of the last few dozen winners of this award, and we were absolutely shocked to find out that none of them were under the age of 65. Seems unfair to exclude eligibility based on age. If anything, we need to give Pete Davidson this award for a few consecutive years to balance things out. Plus, we’re hoping we can finally nab that precious early 20s target demographic that we’ve been hearing so much about. One could say the ceremony really did a ‘glow up’ this year and we’re ‘simping’ for Cham Cham. I think I said that right.”
Local Gen Zer Madison Weinberg couldn’t be more excited about the announcement.
“As someone who’s seen almost all of Timothée’s appearances on websites that talk about his dating history, I’m very proud of him,” said Weinberg without so much as breaking eye contact with TikTok. “After all, it’s a ‘lifetime’ achievement award. Why give it to someone who’s over the age of 30? That’s when life literally ends. Either way, I’m still not going to be watching the Oscars. Mostly because I haven’t even heard of a large percentage of these people that were nominated. Like, who the hell is Steven Spielberg?”
Chalamet appeared somewhat surprised by the decision.
“Seems like only a few years ago I did my first movie in 2014,” said the “Dune” actor who’s coincidentally also been nominated for “most pinchable cheeks” by grandmothers around the country. “You know, when I was young, everyone around me said I had a certain ‘it’ factor. Only they called it a ‘nepo’ factor. I don’t know what that means, but I guess I can chalk up this entire achievement to whatever that is. Thanks, nepo!”
At press time, the Academy further turned heads after announcing that 24-year-old YouTube star MrBeast will be nominated for several awards, including Best Documentary (Short Subject) and a new category called Best Vibes.
As the foremost source of punk rock journalism, rules are almost sacred to The Hard Times. Which is why we are unable to include posthumous compilation “Etc.” and live recording “Live 4/30/96” in our definitive ranking. Look, we know it blows. I mean, you’re telling us that “Kiss the Bottle” never made it onto an album? And are these really the best recordings we have of “Gemini” and “For Esme” – they sound like the band was playing a set in an abandoned tractor factory. Well, whatever, they’re both good albums. But since they aren’t studio releases we guess they can both fuck off. Sorry, Jawbreaker. Maybe this will finally get you off your fat asses and back into the studio again.
One of them had to be at the bottom of the list so it might as well be “Unfun.” Most fairweather Jawbreaker fans will probably just listen to album lead-off track “Want” and be done with it. Admittedly, there is a sameness to a lot of the songs and the band hadn’t really developed completely into the dark, melodic intricacies that Jawbreaker would eventually become known for. I dunno, maybe Schwarzenbach just hadn’t started mainlining Kerouac by this point. But still, “Unfun” remains the cornerstone of what 90’s pop-punk would become.
True story: “Chesterfield King” was the first Jawbreaker song I ever heard. I thought it was so darkly romantic. I remember being drunk at a party when I was eighteen and singing it to this girl that I had a huge crush on and then later that night I lost my virginity to her. Unfortunately though I was a shithead and a relationship never progressed and I fucked things up and now I’m left with a bittersweet memory of what could have been.
I strongly considered placing this album at number one, and not just because I thought it would give me a lot of hate comments on Twitter to have to deal with. But because this is one of the most complete works of art to encase heartbreak and depression that has ever existed. Doesn’t matter how much psilocybin and cocaine I’ve been on while I was listening to it, “Dear You” is a total effort to reach the core of human sorrow. And it does. REBECCA!!!
If this isn’t your perfect record then congratulations, you have done everything right in your life. You have no health problems, your partner loves you, you don’t question your friendships – you’re killing it. For the rest of us this is Jawbreaker apex. “Boxcar” is the immediate classic, even if it does sound like it was written by an anemic eighth grader, but this whole album basically punches you in the face and kind of just leaves its fist there – and lets you feel like you kind of deserve it. It’s fair to say that if you don’t love this record then you are an actual sociopath and should probably seek therapy.
