A Dream Come True? Blink-182 Reunite.
By: Paul G. Atkinson IV (International Culture Correspondent)
Check out the article at Stetson University’s The Reporter website HERE.
I woke up and my dreams were a reality. With the time change across the pond (I’m studying abroad in Scotland currently) it would have been 3am by the time the Grammys were finished and there wasn’t a TV set to be found broadcasting the show anyway. Normally I stray far away from the mainstream award shows where the music categories merely jerk off album sales over musical integrity, but this year’s show had something only my days of Dickies shorts and summers spent at skate parks could hope for.
I went to sleep with a twisting tornado of rumors spinning around in my head and when I awoke the storm had settled and blink-182 was a band once again. Message boards became crowded with speculation when MTV announced the trio would be on stage together for the first time since the band announced an “indefinite hiatus” in 2005.
It was said they would simply be giving out the award for “best rock album” (spoiler alert: Coldplay won), but once on stage a nonchalant Travis Barker (drummer) proceeded the award presentation by saying, “we used to play music together… and uh, we decided we’re going to play music together again” shortly followed by an enthusiastic Mark Hoppus (bass guitar, vocals) shouting out, “BLINK-182 IS BACK!” while an awkward Tom DeLonge (guitar, vocals) stood by their side.
The band’s website (www.blink182.com) is revamped and has a brief message from the guys announcing a new album and plans for a full scale world tour by this summer, with new merchandise on sale now.
Blink-182 were my childhood musical heroes and I know many share this feeling. Within hours of waking up I had an old friend call me exclaiming that we must paint my ’94 Volvo pink, spray-paint the blink-182 smiley face logo across both sides and follow the band across America this summer. About a quadrillion facebook status updates commented in excitement of the news.
The whole reason I learned to play the drums, why I made shitty bands, why I started listening to music that was vaguely punk, and wandered down a path towards a complete obsession with rock music was because of these guys. They were poppy enough to get stuck in my head, but punk enough to say “fuck” while being immature enough to talk about erections.
Lyrics from songs like “Story of a Lonely Guy” and “First Date” perfectly described my ineptitude towards the opposite sex. “Dammit” was a sing-a-long that was the story of my high school days nearly verbatim. To this day when “All The Small Things” “What’s My Age Again?” or any of the other chart topping hits blink wrote blast out of speakers at a party every single person sings along.
The band’s initial break up was as sad a day for me and, undoubtedly, many others around the world as it was a glorious day when the band reunited… but can they deliver?
It’s been four years since their last tour and six since their last album. They left a musical legacy with their last album by showing that pop-punk could be fun and catchy while being experimental, intelligent, and emotionally captivating. They left a legacy with their live show on the unforgettable “Mark, Tom, And Travis Show (The Enema Strikes Back)” live album that combines dangerously fast renditions of the band’s best tunes interspersed with the most absurd bathroom humor ever spoken aloud.
A lot has happened in the last four or so years. All the band members have married and have had kids. Hoppus and Barker put out an album under the name +44 while DeLonge put out two albums with Angels & Airwaves. Barker had a reality show, did a whole bunch of recording with rap artists (which I still don’t completely understand) and almost died in a plane crash.
It’s hard to mess up a pop-punk record. Though, if their last album is the standard for success they’ve got a lot of work to do to top it. The mediocrity of all the member’s solo projects could easily clash into a disastrous hodge-podge record with a little bit of everything, but not a bit of anything. Also, can either Hoppus or DeLonge still sing about ejaculating into a sock or shitting their pants while being 30+ year old fathers and not seem completely fake or just stupid?
I’m crossing my fingers and hoping for the best. The band has a lot to prove and with a starving fan base ready to clamp their jaws on anything new from the blink-182 camp they don’t have much time to show what they’ve got before people get pissed off. I’m willing to wait, but I’m also ready to relive my childhood. The question is: are blink-182 ready to do the same? The summer of 2009 holds the answers. Get ready.
