I Don't Want To Grow Up

Album: I Don't Want To Grow Up (1985)
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Songfacts®:

  • One of the most popular songs by the California punk rockers Descendents, "I Don't Want To Grow Up" makes its point in a 1:19 runtime and a very biting lyric:

    I don't want to grow up
    If growing up means being like you


    The song was written by their bass player, Tony Lombardo, who was the oldest in the group... by far. Like 16 years older. He was in his mid-30s when the song was released in 1985.

    "I think he was on to something where music is what keeps us young," Descendents lead singer Milo Aukerman told Songfacts. "Punk rock keeps us young. He was an early aficionado of that."
  • "I Don't Want To Grow Up" is the title track to the second Descendents album. Their logo is a cartoonish sketch of Milo Aukerman, whose avatar on the album cover appears to be wearing a diaper. The band took some time off after their first album (Milo Goes to College in 1982) so that Milo could get a degree - a very grown-up thing to do.
  • Descendents are one of the most influential groups to emerge from the West Coast punk rock scene in the '80s. One of their descendents was Blink-182, which released a song with a very similar theme in 1999: "What's My Age Again?"

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