It was a few years ago when One More Night came out, and I came up to my friend and asked her, “have you heard Adam Levine’s new song?” Silly me, I didn’t realize Adam is part of a band called Maroon 5. A few years passed, and I went to a concert that featured a band I liked with Maroon 5. I left the concert becoming less of a fan of that band, and a great lover for Maroon 5. Today I am more than proud to call them one of my favorite bands.

They started off as “Kara’s Flowers” in 1995, and later, changed the name to Maroon 5 for unknown reasons. They claim the meaning of the name to be private. Their breakout into the music industry came in 2002 with their single Harder To Breath, but they did produce music before. In 1997 they released their first single Soap Disco. It has a rocky feeling to it, a style very different from the music they produce now. Their first album was Songs About Jane which is composed of 14 songs. Some songs have the rocky, guitar feeling, in them like Tangled and Harder To Breath. Then there are some songs with softer singing and rather a more poppy sound like This Love, Sunday Morning, and She Will Be Loved. Fun fact, Songs About Jane was inspired by Levine’s ex-girlfriend, Jane.

Their second album as Maroon 5 was It Won’t Be Soon Before Long. The album is amazing- featuring great songs like Wake Up Call, If I Never See Your Face Again (has a version featuring Rihanna), Goodnight Goodnight, Makes Me Wonder, Won’t Go Home Without You and a few others. In this album, in my opinion, they started to lean towards the poppy sound in their music, although it still had some rock stuff.

Their third album was Hands All Over. I think in this album they started with a funky stylish with their single Give A Little More. The album includes several well-known songs such as Misery (their first single for this album), Hands All Over, Never Gonna Leave This Bed, and later added Moves Like Jagger featuring Christiana Aguilera (fun fact: they re-released the album just to include this song). Moves Like Jagger was such a hit that it became the band’s second number one song on the charts. The album was known worldwide, gaining huge success in countries like Japan where the album was certified as a “Gold Album.”

Their fourth album was Overexposed. It was released in 2012 and gained a lot of love. For the non-Maroon 5 fans out there, I think this album was well known for them too. In my opinion, it was an album that got a lot of attention. I think it’s also one of my favorite albums, although I love all their albums. Anyhow, it features many great songs like One More Night, Payphone featuring Wiz Khalifa, Daylight, Lucky Strike, Tickets, Wipe Your Eyes and more. This was really their first album that caught my attention.

Their fifth album V was definitely their second musical turning point. It was all different from anything they have done so far. It sounded electro mixed with pop. The song Unkiss Me especially. The sound is so different from the sound Maroon 5 fans were used to. The album has songs like Maps, Animals, Unkiss Me, Sugar, It Was Always You, Lost Stars and more. After this album fans could see Maroon 5 began a new era of music.

Fans weren’t wrong. The sixth and most current album Maroon 5 released, Red Pill Blues, was nothing similar to their older music. I must admit, I am not a fan of their new style. Writing this article was the first time I heard the full album because I personally didn’t like their singles for this album, so I never got the chance to hear the full album. Even after hearing the full album, I am still not a fan of the new style. Some of the songs in the album include What Lovers Do featuring SZA, Lips On You, Wait, and other songs.

Now that hopefully you have all become Maroon 5 experts (or maybe fans too) I will pick my 3 favorite songs from every album (not in preference order).

Songs About Jane

1. Tangled
2. This Love
3. She Will Be Loved

It Won’t Be Soon Before Long

1. Wake Up Call
2. Makes Me Wander
3. Goodnight Goodnight

Hands All Over

1. Misery
2. Never Gonna Leave This Bed
3. Moves Like Jagger

Overexposed

1. Lucky Strike
2. The Man Who Never Lied
3. Daylight

V

1. Lost Stars
2. Sugar
3. It Was Always You

Red Pill Blues– as mentioned before, I am not a fan of the album.