New Blink-182 album proves
Tom, Mark, Travis have feelings
By
Kyle Boggs
Summer Reporter
Blink-182 is changing with each album. It was
rumored that with their newest album, "Take Off Your Pants and Jacket,"
the band was trying to end its digression into the world of pop and
return to their once punk sound found in earlier albums like "Cheshire
Cat" and "Dude Ranch." However, this is not entirely the case.
"Take Off Your Pants and Jacket," Blink's fifth
studio album, is an emotional album that has a pop/punk sound that
works well for the band, but its roots in punk are hard to strain
out of the pop melodies.
This album is much more concerned with guitar
picking than the traditional blaring background chords that Blink
fans are used to. The album also features instruments never heard
on any of their albums such as a clarinet, a piano and acoustic guitars.
The great thing about Blink-182 is their honesty
and ability to comfortably say anything they want. In the last few
years, they have fallen in love with fast, punchy three-chord kicks
that dive into suburban teenage romance, confusion and frustration
with girls who don't like them, bathroom-graffiti jokes as well as
serious issues among teens such as suicide and divorce.
Shreds of evidence reminiscent of the background
dropkick chords and high pitched guitar crunches found in "Dude Ranch,"
and "Cheshire Cat" can still be found in songs like "Anthem Part Two,"
"Online Songs" and "The Rock Show."
However, a song like "First Date" would make
old Blink fans cringe, and wonder why their favorite band would write
a sappy love song so obviously geared toward MTV's Total Request Live
crowd of 10-to-13-year-old girls who like to think they're listening
to punk rock.
While most Blink-182 songs are fun and lighthearted,
sometimes they do come up with a song that touches on the emotions
of many of their fans. "Adam's Song," from their last album "Enema
of the State," discusses the pain associated with suicide and the
strength it takes to over come it.
In their new album, "Stay Together For the Kids,"
is a beautifully written song that deals with the pain and confusion
that a kid goes through when his parents get a divorce. The song reflects
on many different angles of sadness, helplessness and anger. It goes
back and forth from slow quiet cries such as, "I'm ripe with things
to say /The words rot and fall away/ If this stupid poem could fix
this home/ I'd read it every day," to loud angry choruses that seem
to be sarcastically saying to parents "I hope you're happy."
In the album's first radio single, "The Rock
Show," bassist Mark Hoppus sings about meeting a girl at a Warped
Tour, which comes across just as humorous as the Ramones finding true
love at a "Burger King soda machine" in "Oh Oh I Love Her So."
Blink-182 can be compared with the Ramones because
neither is too concerned with saying anything profound, they're just
normal guys who like to have fun and sing what's on their mind no
matter how serious (or not) the songs are.
