Artist Blink-182

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Blink-182

Originally greeted as a sophomoric, sub-Green Day pretender, Blink-182 showed no sign of staying power when it broke through with 1997’s Dude Ranch. Yet a dozen years later (and four after its acrimonious breakup), Blink’s 2009 reunion was one of the summer’s biggest tours. How did this happen? Well, for all the juvenile humor—and there was plenty of it—in Blink’s music, the band knew how to write maddeningly catchy pop-punk songs that always had more pathos than their predilection for dick jokes indicated. A new single, “Up All Night,” from the upcoming Neighborhoods, leans closer to singer Tom DeLonge’s Angels & Airwaves than “What’s My Age Again?” and suggests a more experimental, if not more mature, stage in the band’s surprisingly lasting career.

Updated 08/24/2011