blink 182’s impact on the Toronto music scene

From saving marriages to inspiring musicians, the SoCal pop-punk trio has left its stamp on the Toronto music scene.

Blink 182 recently released their ninth studio album. The band decided to name it NINE. NINE shows a change in the band’s sound but sticks to its roots. The Rolling Stone said the band “sound more self-aware and mature on ‘Nine‘”, calling it a “nuanced success”.  

Fans of the group know that blink 182 has and always will be known for its raunchy songs about voyeurism, love, and teenage life. Influenced by The Cure and punk bands such as the Descendents, blink used its love of toilet humour to make its mark in the SoCal underground scene. Bassist and co-founder Mark Hoppus would hand out tape cassettes to anyone who would take them. Co-founder and former member Tom DeLonge would push to get the band’s singles on the radio. After many years of trying to make it, the band broke out into the mainstream with its Billboard-topping album Enema of The State. This album had an impact on many people. 

The New Yorker’s Kelefa Sanneh wrote in 2016 that Blink-182  pawned “more imitators than any American rock band since Nirvana.”

The Atlantic’s pop culture writer Spencer Kornhaber wrote in his review of the band’s latest album, although, the blink 182 of new can still give off the impression of “kegger-party clowns”, their latest record is “secretly serious”. He goes onto write, “The brattiness has dimmed. Their influence is wide. Their new album is very, very catchy.” 

Skedline reporter Christian Holmes set out to put the “influence is wide” theory to the task. He asked Toronto musicians how blink 182’s music, if at all, has influenced them and their music Here are his results:

Ryan Harvey-MacIntyre sayst blink 182 saved his marriage. “We had bought two concert tickets for a show in Toronto a few years ago. We separated just after buying the tickets, then ran into each other at the show, in front of Mark’s side of the stage while they played I Miss You. Harvey-MacIntyre says he and his wife got to talking during the song and “made up after the show”. According to Harvey-MacIntyre, the couple has been “happier than ever”. 

For Michael Santellano, blink 182’s music has helped through some tough spots in his life. He says he credits the band’s music for saving his life and has nothing but nice things to say about the current incarnation of the “crappy punk rock” trio. “They’re awesome human beings! And to me, a constant reminder to thrive at whatever I do. They’re my ‘pick me up’ band and my motivator,” says Santellano. “When I got to see them live not too long ago, I bought a VIP pass to meet them and they were so nice. It was a dream come through.”

Avid drummer Jeremy Adam was still in high school when blink 182 released its album Dude Ranch in 1997. He remembers hearing the first track Pathetic and instantly being glued to the album and the band that made it. “The chorus to ‘Pathetic’ reeled me in and by the time I made it to ‘Damnit’, I knew I was going to love blink for a long, long time,” Adam says. “Most people don’t know this about me, but Scott Raynor’s (the drummer on the album before Travis Barker joined the band a couple of years later) drumming on Dude Ranch was the reason why I picked up drumsticks and tried creating my own music.”

The guitar-playing Ian Kaczer first heard of blink 182 when he was watching MTV with his buddies and the music video for Damnit came on. “It sounded so good and quite frankly, the song itself sounded different but in a good way,” Kaczer explains. “The thing that stood out the most for me was Tom DeLonge’s Stratocaster. As I started following the band and went to a couple of their shoes, I absolutely fell in love with his taste of his guitars. The colours of the Stratocaster I’ve had for the past 15-plus years are because of Tom’s guitars.”

Eitan Garazi, the drummer for underground punk band Napoleon, has a few “hot takes” for blink fans. “Blink has always been a huge influence for me. Travis Barker is one of the greatest drummers ever and is one of the people I model myself over,” said Garazi. “That said, I’m not the biggest fan of their new sound but I will never get tired of the classic ‘blink sound’.”

Lifelong blink 182 fan Frank Pellerito had a joke to crack. When asked if blink 182 inspired him, he looked at his buddies and pointed to the person closest to him, “Tom DeLonge influenced his mom.”

“Some things just never change,” replied his buddy.