“I’m not the same, the years have passed,” Millencolin’s singer and bassist Nikola Sarcevic proclaims on “Brand New Game,” one of the better tracks on the band’s seventh LP “Machine 15” “It kind of scares me how it went so fast.” And speed by the years did. Led by this Örebro, Sweden quartet, Swedish skate punk bands like No Fun at All, Satanic Surfers and Bombshell Rocks enjoyed a mid-1990s heyday thanks thanks to lofty tempos, sunny melodies and a licensing deal that gave this country’s popular punk label Epitaph the rights to release records by that country’s popular punk label Burning Heart.

A decade later, when most bands their age have either gotten rich or gotten tired, Millencolin are still going strong. Three years since their last LP, “Machine 15″ is the sound of a band growing older. Gone are the hyper-speed rhythms that dominated early albums like “Life on a Plate” and “Pennybridge Pioneers,” replaced here by tempos more familiar to rock radio and a slick candy (ma)sheen — also familiar to rock radio — courtesy of producer Lou Giordano (Goo Goo Dolls, Plain White Ts).

But the band is aware of their age. “I never thought that I invented the wheel,” Sarcevic sings on the title track, a reference to the group’s decade and a half together. “All I ever aim for is something real / Creativity is still my gasoline.” Which also happens to be an accurate assessment of the band’s career. Never particularly groundbreaking, Millencolin earned their loyal fanbase through hard work and good cheer. Perhaps some of that loyalty even comes from their frequently corny lyrics, which intentional or not, often cause a smile. Take “Detox” for example, which finds a lover rejected for paying more attention to his record collection and not enough to his lady: “Just like the meat you eat / The booze you choose / The nicotine, the coffee and the sugars that you need / So you’re not ready for detox, turn on the radio!” Cheesy? Yep, but let’s not forget English isn’t their native tongue.

Primarily though Millencolin lack the world weariness of a band their age. In “Broken World,” society’s problems are over-simplified, as is the solution: “Start a band.” And “Turnkey Paradise,” which tackles the well-worn punk topic of life in the suburbs, fails to say anything the Descendents didn’t say already in “Suburban Home” with half the lyrics and twice the immediacy.

Like many pop punk bands their age, particularly No Use For a Name, who seem to be following a strangely similar career trajectory, Millencolin haven’t aged ungracefully, just kind of boring. Their recent records have cheery melodies, slick production values and a genial likability. But they aren’t special. Nor are they unlikable enough to make them memorably bad. Which isn’t a terrible thing after all. The Foo Fighters have made a career out of releasing mediocre records that are neither great nor awful. These days, it seems Millencolin just kind of exist. And in some ways, that’s a worse fate than not existing at all.

Millencolin - “Brand New Game” from Machine 15
Millencolin - “Detox” from Machine 15
Millencolin - “No Cigar” from Pennybridge Pioneers
Millencolin - “Twenty Two” from For Monkeys

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