8/10

There's something immediately familiar about 'Far From It', but MTVKID are smart enough not to let nostalgia do all the work.

The Helsinki-based band pull heavily from the late-90s and early-2000s pop-punk that they clearly love, but the five-track EP feels more like a revival of attitude than anything else. Distorted guitars, punchy drums and oversized choruses are everywhere, yet beneath the noise sits a much more contemporary sense of uncertainty.

‘Yeah Yeah’ and ‘Fight Back’ arrive with the kind of restless momentum that suits the band’s SoCal influences, while ‘CA$H’ leans into their sharper, more sarcastic side. There's an easy looseness to these songs, but they are never throwaway. The hooks land hard because the emotions underneath them feel recognisable throughout.

‘I’ve Got Nothing to Say to Make You Stay’ shifts the mood into more bruised territory, exposing the insecurity beneath the humour and distortion. And that vulnerability carries into closing track ‘Don’t Let Go’, which gives the EP a fitting final note of emotional tension.

The title also pulls those different moods together brilliantly. 'Far From It' can mean distance from home, certainty, another person, or simply the version of yourself you thought you would have figured out by now. And that sense of dislocation feels especially apt for a band made up of members from the USA, France, Russia and Finland.

And that's where the EP really succeeds. The crunchy guitars and big choruses may recall Weezer, Nirvana and early-2000s pop-punk, but MTVKID are using that language to soundtrack a modern confusion.

Short, loud, melodic and full of personality, 'Far From It' feels like exactly the kind of EP built to be shouted back from the front row.