Angels & Airwaves: Breaking the mould

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Angels & Airwaves: Breaking the mould

April 18th 2006 04:37

The future of punk is here - and its name is Angels and Airwaves. Forget Green Day, forget emo, and you can definitely forget the punk of the early 80s - musical genius Tom Delonge has made history with his new band, leaving a visible path on the way. It has been quite obvious for a while that Tom Delonge's vision of music is unlike any other seen before, and that he will stop at nothing to get to it.

Tom Delonge - Genius

Despite the fact that the brand of pop-punk delivered by Blink 182 during the 90s can be attributed to Green Day, it seems that it was not exactly what Tom Delonge - the guitarist with the nasal voice - desired from his music. The first sign of his revolution was with the formation of Boxcar Racer, basically Blink 182 without bassist Mark Hopper, and yet distinctly different. Their only album, released in 2002, mixed heavy punk with mellow instrumentals and vocals. Blink 182's successive release, "Take Off Your Pants and Jacket," returned to their normal style, with the exception of "Stay Together for the Kids," which was reminiscent of Boxcar's uniqueness. It was only with Blink 182's self-titled album did Tom Delonge's vision truly become apparent, breaking away from cliched pop-punk towards a more original style. Angels and Airwaves heralds the beginning of the end of traditional punk - and the beginning of something bigger and inherently better.

"For the past 6 months, Tom DeLonge has been in the studio preparing the greatest rock-n-roll revolution for this generation."

This is the news on the Boxcar Racer site, and they have certainly lived up to expectations, at least in my own opinion. Their first release, "We Don't Need to Whisper" eradicates the rather annoying voice that is Mark Hopper, and the dominating drum style that Travis Barker is infamous for - and sacrifices it all for a mellow-punk style that reminds me more of "The Postal Service" than Green Day. It is distinctly Tom Delonge - confusing, mellow, and yet it always retains that punk essence that made Blink 182 famous.

While many may see Angels & Airwaves as a reincarnation of Boxcar Racer, it is that and so much more. The lack of Travis Barker allows for a whole other layer of music to be included, free of the amazing yet incessant and cliched showing-off that Barker is so well known for. From the huge, orchestral and chaotic intro that is "Valkyrie Missile" to tracks like "the War" which completely transforms traditional punk, Angels & Airwaves creates music that is not so reliant on Travis Barker's over-the-top drums, but rather combines a mix synth, drum machines and the familiar sound of a punk trio to create a unique style.

The magic of Tom Delonge, and now Angels & Airwaves, is the ability to create music that you can chill out to, and yet still has that heaviness to it that makes you want to run to the moshpit. It is truly a new day for punk, and I for one am glad that it has taken a whole new direction, different from image-intensive bands like Green Day, and the numerous emo attention-grabbers.

Links:

Official Site

MySpace Profile - "The Adventure" is their current single

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Posted By: Jimbo - Category: Artist Review

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Comments

13 Comments. [ Add A Comment ]

Comment by Cibbuano

April 19th 2006 00:47

Hunt Famous
Orble Post of the Day
Fat Cult
Techbreak

you really like this emo/punk/indie stuff, eh?

Comment by Jimbo

April 19th 2006 01:17

I generally like all music, but yeah it tends to fall into those genres. The only thing I don't like is unoriginal hip hop which uses one musical loop throughout the whole song. I do like SOME hip hop stuff, but its hard to please me in that genre - Black Eyed Peas are a good one.

Comment by Cibbuano

April 19th 2006 01:30

Hunt Famous
Orble Post of the Day
Fat Cult
Techbreak

really, you like all music? You should post on different genres... capture a wider audience...

Comment by Jimbo

April 19th 2006 01:39

I try - its just hard to do it when the majority I listen to is in those genres. But thanks for the tip - I will definitely try it.

Comment by Aussieskater211

April 26th 2006 14:52

OKAY, Now this was a load of crapm in many ways. FIRSTLY, the Blink 182 Bassist "Mark Hopper", is not "Mark Hopper", it is Mark Hoppus. Now Blink 182 were bloody great, Angels And Airwaves are bloody great. Dont Diss Travis Barker hes a bloody great drummer, he could kick any ones ass drumming. Tom Delongue can not create a band as good as Blink 182 all by himself, Travis and Mark helped, a bloody lot. There old stuff was great too, which was written by Mark. Tom also wrote all the stuf on their last 3 albums, and was the one behind all the sick, yet funny jokes. ITS MARK HOPPUS!! NOT "HOPPER".......

Comment by Aussieskater211

April 26th 2006 14:53

OKAY, Now this was a load of crap in many ways. FIRSTLY, the Blink 182 Bassist "Mark Hopper", is not "Mark Hopper", it is Mark Hoppus. Now Blink 182 were bloody great, Angels And Airwaves are bloody great. Dont Diss Travis Barker hes a bloody great drummer, he could kick any ones ass drumming. Tom DeLonge can not create a band as good as Blink 182 all by himself, Travis and Mark helped, a bloody lot. There old stuff was great too, which was written by Mark. Tom also wrote all the stuf on their last 3 albums, and was the one behind all the sick, yet funny jokes. ITS MARK HOPPUS!! NOT "HOPPER".......

Comment by Jimbo

April 27th 2006 12:50

Heywoahheywoahheywoahhey... Didn't mean to cause a ruckus.

Ok I'm sorry about the whole mispelling of Mark Hoppus, but to me he's just not as memorable as Travis Barker and Tom Delonge. Secondly, I never said Travis Barker wasn't a great drummer - I think he's an excellent drummer. I think he just has this showiness to him that doesn't takes up a whole layer of music - in Angels and Airwaves, that layer is free and is filled up with something that is, to me, more worthwhile. Also, Blink 182 were a great band, I especially loved their last album, but Angels and Airwaves is an extension of that with a dimension that I just didn't expect from that.

My conclusion? Angels and Airwaves are an evolution of all of Tom Delonge's previous musical experiences - as with all musical evolutions, they will leave something behind which some listeners will dislike and regret - its inevitable, and I'm just glad that this time in worked in my favour. I prefer Angels and Airwaves to Blink 182 for a reason i can't explain - they share very similar techniques and styles (well to the last Blink album anyway) but just went that step further. Had this album been written with Blink 182's members, I think it would have turned out a lot different, for better or worse.

Comment by Anonymous

May 24th 2006 21:16

It's "Mark Hoppus" -- not "Mark Hopper"

Comment by Jimbo

May 25th 2006 00:29

Thanks but the issue has already been raised.

Comment by Anonymous

May 28th 2006 20:17

Blink 182's successive release, "Take Off Your Pants and Jacket," returned to their normal style

One more thing that's, I think, important in charting the genesis of AVA, is that Boxcar was after TOYPAJ, and led directly to the fairly hefty change of direction that was the untitled album.

Oh, and it's not Hopper - it's Hoppus. I'm surprised nobody's mentioned that already...

Comment by Anonymous

April 30th 2007 14:01

perfectly said about AVA
i completely agree
new sound...new thoughts...new look.
love it...sooo different from attention hungry bands like Green Day or others.

Comment by Anonymous

April 30th 2007 14:05

and i beg to differ on Travis kicking any one's booty at drumming....check out "The Mars Volta"....they are a break away from "At The Drive In"...another band that revolutionized "punk".....their drummer is amazing...but i still like trav a lil better....but with what AVA does in their music it just suits me better....you go in a different dimension if you listen good enough

Comment by Anonymous

October 12th 2007 21:58

i totally agree.
travis barker is definitely a great drummer, probly one of the best there is. the thing is, no other bands drumnmer really sticks out in my mind, and that tells me that blink182's the only band that relies on so so SO many drum solos.

barkers incredible, but sometimes, the stuff that he pulled was a bit much.

mark hoppus wasnt as memorable as the othr members of blink182, but he was still an essential part. i just dont like him, because i believe him to be the reason why blink broke up. there are so many things floating around, but, the way i see it, they all go back to mark.

tom wanted to move on, but mark wanted to keep the same style. so they broke up.

tom experimented with new styles- without including mark. mark was pissed. they broke up.

tom wanted to skip a tour so that he could be with his wife when she gave birth to his first son, rocket. mark didnt agree. so they broke up.

tom wanted to spend more time at home and be there for his family. mark wanted to stay loyal to his fans. so they broke up.

etc...

im sure that tom and travis are to blame for certain things, but from what i can tell, tom is the only one who hasnt really gotten over the whole breakup thing. in the new trailor for his 2008 movie, the first thing he says is, do you believe that everything happens for a reason?

im rambling. bottom line is, blink182 was awesome, AVA is a different kind of awesome, and tom, travis and mark are all amazing,

and plus 44 sucks.

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