POP FEMINIST PERBLOG

BLACK COAT WHITE SHOES BLACK HAT CADILLAC

synecdoche:

2000spoppunk:

“Fat Lip” by Sum 41 off All Killer, No Filler (2001)

pro-tip: a good way to choose friends is to put this song on at a party. if you spot anyone complaining or not singing, kick them out. you have no room for negativity in your life.

just want to reiterate that this is the single truest thing i’ve ever typed on the internet.

I’ve totally taken this advice before

markhoppus:

Legend (Taken with Instagram at Stamford Bridge)

Lucas once gave me a long lecture about the significance of Mark Hoppus being a FC Chelsea fan but I can’t remember the conclusions.

IDGAF I’m a Chelsea fan now, too.

oneweekoneband:

punkrockdanny: How did the blink side project “Box Car Racer” make you feel?
Mark Hoppus: weird, betrayed, jealous. probably more than i should have.

Weird, Betrayed, and Jealous: The 100% True blink-182 Fanfiction Story, 2002-2011

Chapter one

Mark Hoppus was touring the U.S. with all his best friends in the world. There was Tom, and Travis, and Tre, and B.J, and Mike, and at least 80 of his best Atticus shirts. All on one bus! He was having the time of his life. One morning, in the hotel, sipping coffee, he picked up The Palm Beach Post. The front page headline read:

Mark Hoppus, Your Best Friends All Started A Band Without You

He continued to read, heart sinking.

It’s just that we’re too mature for blink-182, you know? I was like, “Travis, Mark just doesn’t understand me. Artistically. We should start a new band. A band without Mark. No Marks allowed.” We’re really influenced by, like, Fugazi. We just didn’t think Mark would get it.

Chapter two

Box Car Racer was a thing. Mark was really sad about it. It was weird for everybody.

One day, Mark ran over to Tom’s house and pounded on the door. When he finally answered, Mark was like, “Listen, bro, I got a copy of 13 Songs. I listen to it all the time. Can we be friends again?” Tom agreed. They recorded blink-182.

Months later, the trio sat on their couch. They each had a copy of The Gazette—I dunno which Gazette, some Gazette—on their laps, reading the headlines with pleased smirks on their faces.

blink-182 Releases An Album. They Like Fugazi Now. It’s Mature. It’s Great. They All Have Kids. It’s Great. Good For Them.

Mark gazed lovingly into Tom’s eyes. “You know what Fugazi would do? They would totally go on tour, but only charge a dollar for the shows. I know back in 2000 we called them assholes for doing that, but things are different now. I think we should do that.” So they did it. Mark had so much fun.

Chapter three

“I don’t wanna!” Tom said.
“You gotta!” Mark said.
“You’re not my dad!” Tom said.
And then they broke up for a few years.

Chapter four

“You are not the only ones who can record a Mature Side Project, Tom and Travis!” Mark said. And then, “Travis, will you be in my band?” And so was +44. Mostly they toured and played covers of mid-period blink-182 songs. It was really weird for everyone.

Chapter five

Tom Delonge had been taking a lot of painkillers. He was thinking a lot about Jesus, and how he was better than Jesus. He called the editor-in-chief at The Post—I dunno which Post, some Post. “Print this!” he exclaimed. And they did.

Angels & Airwaves “The Greatest Rock and Roll Revolution for This Generation,”* Says Author of Such Classics As “Dick Lips”

*This part is real

It was really sad for everyone.

One day, Travis—the only member of blink-182 who wasn’t being a total whiny dickbag, and also the member with the most actual credibility and the hottest wife—got in a terrible plane crash. He almost died.

Mark and Tom both rushed to Travis’s side, their eyes meeting.

“Let’s get back together,” Mark said. “I miss you guys.”
“I’m not sure that’s gonna work right now,” Travis said.
“Yeah, alright,” Tom said.

They called MTV. Mark did most of the talking. They recorded Neighborhoods.

This happened.  I never meant for it to happen, but it happened.

SEVENTEEN THOUSAND WORDS

SEVEN

TEEN

THOUSAND

WORDS

ON

BLINK-182

oneweekoneband:

On “All The Small Things,” Or, Why I Didn’t Want to Write About “All The Small Things”

I.

I just hate Tom Delonge, and I especially hate every feeling Tom Delonge has had since 1998. (So, you know, post-piercing Tom Delonge.)

II.

We need to talk about Tom Delonge’s feelings, though. “All the Small Things” is essentially Delonge’s belated answer to Mark Hoppus’s “Josie” with two major differences: the heroine of “Small Things” is a real lady (the future Mrs. Delonge, actually) as opposed to the fictive Josie; and “Small Things” sucks.

Both are lamentations on relationships mid-tour, both feature girlfriends who pass the ultimate test of loyalty in distance. The girlfriend v. punk rock narrative is one that pops up all over the blink chronology. (Really, it’s as timeless a punk theme as any.) “Apple Shampoo” is a song about what happens when she’s no Josie and they can’t make it work (“one home, one out on tour again”). The reason “the candle’s burning at both ends” in “Apple Shampoo,” though, is that she’s in a band, too. (“Both getting tired of punk rock clubs, both playing in punk rock bands.”) It’s not only a logistic tension but a stress on Mark’s pride (an emasculation, literally) and it tears them apart.

I never wanted to hold you back
I just wanted to hold on
but my chance is gone

I know just where I stand
a boy trapped in the body of a man
and I’ll take what you’re willing to give
and I’ll teach myself to live
with a walk-on part in a background shot
as an extra in a movie I’m not in

she’s so important
and I’m so retarded

There are other chapters in this story, too. Did you guys know that, allegedly, when blink formed, Mark had some stereotypically naggy girlfriend who gave him the “It’s Me Or The Band” ultimatum and he chose Scott Raynor’s four-track? It’s part of the blink-182 creation story.

But anyway, back to the stay-at-home girlfriends of “Small Things” and “Josie.” Both pass the the ultimate test of “being awake when their blink boyfriends come home after a long day of hard work.” Both rage obnoxious merch girl vibes (support staff, punk nurturer): they both go to the shows, they both designate to drive, they both do a whole lot of waiting and a lot of validating of Mark and Tom’s mundane feelings and conversation. But you know what the biggest difference is, I think? That crucial UL and DHC. Like, Delonge’s doting punk girlfriend isn’t afforded a verse of development whatsoever, much less one that grants her some stake in the cultural capital that matters to punk boys. But Josie, even in all the June Cleavering, is still an authentic punk. And that’s as close to empowerment as I can ask for.

“All the Small Things” sucks.

III.

But even I love

work sucks
I know.

It’s the commiseration of which he foretold. Tom Delonge loves coming home to a woman willing to listen to him whine about capitalism doing shit, and he wants her emotional and spatial support. He wants her to care about his feelings, and this line is supposed to convince us that she totally does. To me, though, that harmony is endearing for aforementioned homosocial reasons. Maybe Tom intended to sing about a wifely empathy, but it is a dudely kind of support that we witness. It’s Mark and Travis that back Tom up, vocally, literally, emotionally. Mark and Travis harmonizing/empathizing with Tom’s vocals/woes is a touching bro moment. It really is. It warms me.

Everyone loves that harmony, right? One of my essential goals in probing “All the Small Things” has been to find out where the hell blink-182 learned to harmonize. I don’t know a thing about vocal harmony, I must admit, but I think the answer is likely “Southern California.” I’m not really sure you can call Milo Goes to College-era Descendents vox much more than “a couple of dudes singing at the same time,” but it is the most likely genealogy of the overwrought harmonies of late-nineties capital-p Pop Punk. (And before Descendents, you know, there was surf music.) It’s not hard to imagine a crooked line drawn from I know I want you to be my wife (1982) to I wanna take you through a wasteland I like to call my home (1994) to you might call him a whore (1995) to work sucks, I know (1999) and ultimately to the hyper-produced, [almost entirely fabricated], proto-autotuned pop punk of Good Charlotte’s first album (2000)*. And beyond.

*Of course, Good Charlotte is an East Coast band and self-professedly more influenced by hip-hop than they ever were by Milo Aukerman. But Good Charlotte is nothing if not a poor (literally, poor) answer to Enema of the State and it’s pertinent if we’re talking about the legacy of those four seconds in “All the Small Things.” Good Charlotte is also one of my favorite albums ever, but maybe that’s neither here nor there.

Anyway, whatever: pop punk has harmonies and people are into it.

IV.

Like, a lot of people, I guess. This song (with the help of “What’s My Age Again?”) shot Enema into platinum so fast. And there I was, a tween into Choking Victim but also mostly just into The Eyeliners, watching a band call itself “punk” when they had millions of people listening to tracks about nothing more than porn stars and sports and domestic life, and I felt I had some territory to defend. For the sake of sanctity, or whatever.

“Posers.”

I was like, if you’re gonna employ this patriarchal male gaze bullshit, the least you could do is pretend like you’ve got some fucking integrity and mention her combat boots or something.*

*I did not say any of that. I was a preteen.

V.

I know that she had wildly curly, dark hair but I don’t remember her face because I was looking at her legs. She was singing the first verse, all the, small things, and we were in the locker room because of course we were in the locker room. I rolled my eyes. Vigorously. She was on the volleyball team. As good as a jock, as far as I was concerned.

I remember those plaid paints, a light Burberry kind of khaki. She and her girlfriends were singing and then she turned and said “I’m doing a punk thing today” and pointed to her thighs. I called her a poser out loud.

If we’re being candid, I will admit that one of those same girls eventually called me a poser for wearing a Green Day shirt. (Touché.) I won’t pretend that it was in that moment that I acquired my feminist second sight and had a realization of sisterhood, but I do remember that after that day we stopped hating each other. We even went to a ska show together once.

To be a girl in 2000.

VI.

I recognize that blink-182 felt some sense of duty, as San Diego skate kids, to set themselves apart from their fellow gajillion-record-sellers. And I also recognize that they felt some weird urge to emasculate famous dudes. Tom told Launch, around this time:

I think it’s so incredible that there are all these boy bands out there, like the Backstreet Boys and 98 Degrees. They’re all so bad! It hurts me, I’ve cried, I’ve pooped my pants. I don’t know why people like these bands so much! They don’t write any of their own music and they actually sit in conference rooms and figure out how to answer interview questions so they can be prepared. And they choreograph everything, including the sex they have with each other after the shows!

I understand it. But I’ve always hated it. This video always reminded me of those boys who cat-called you on the bus, except they were doing it as a joke and the punchline was that you are ugly.

Tom Delonge is totally that guy.

VII.

This song sucks.

This was the first thing I wrote. This was the best thing I wrote.

bagdhadbomber:

The Vindictives….Assembly Line

My baby thought that I’d be the perfect spouse
we left for work from our white suburban house
and then she chewed up fifty tablets of valium (yummy yummy in the tummy)
The food chain and I have a tedious relationship
enslaving me so now I’m dying to exist
but then at dawn ya gotta do it all over again (and again and again and again)

kidradicalreigns:

The Vindictives : I’m In Trouble Now

This is the only band I like. This is who I am now.

It was clear to see that you, like me,
were waiting for the world to stop
because you wanted to get off where I wanted to get off.
And I just keep on getting lost.

It was clear to see that you and me had just about enough of being born.
So now we’re heading for the door but it’s different than before,
this time I feel something more.

It’s just that these lyrics are so important to everything.

God,why are you like this?!?