Photo by: MutinyPR.com

Move over, Mike “The Situation,” there is another proud New Jersey native returning from the depths of the boardwalk to punk-rock you and your hair gel back to Italy. 

After four years, the longest hiatus between album production in a 20-year career, the Bouncing Souls are back. Their eighth album, Ghosts on the Boardwalk, released to much anticipation on Jan. 12. The 12 songs featured were originally released one per month over the course of the past year as a part of the Twentieth Anniversary Series, which like its title hints, commemorates the band’s 20 years of creating and performing.

The album has something to offer for the punk rocker of every persuasion—ranging from the frenzied, screaming edginess in songs like “Badass” to the almost surprisingly sweet and vulnerable sensitivity of “Big Eyes.”

As the album is a testament to 20 years of production, there are many nostalgic flashes found in songs like “We All Sing Along,” where the anthemic nature throws back to those early Jersey roots. The song’s heavy punk and pogo beat might make it a fun live experience, but it falls flat in any other venue and has a long drawn out ending as, “It goes on, and on.” Literally.

“Gasoline” will become an instant favorite for the hardcore listener with it’s heavy sound and shocking lyrics like “Toxic meat, political deceit/Medicate me till I’m dead/And I’ll take life from your can/Just don’t show me who I am.”

Whereas songs like, “Mental Bits” add a welcome diversity to their style with a folk-laden harmonica twang that is enjoyable to even the most conservative of listeners.

With only a few exceptions, the album is surprisingly easy listening, exemplified by the title track, “Ghosts on the Boardwalk”– a song that creates anticipation and excitement even in the introductory notes, building into a perhaps slightly superficial core.

Regardless, it will have your toes tapping and head bobbing, mirroring the phenomenon produced by the album as a whole.