Photo: Jeff Kravitz/FilmMagic
Blink-182was one of the biggest pop-punk bands of the late ’90s and early 2000s.
Formed in 1992, the band originally consisted of bassist and co-lead vocalistMark Hoppus, guitarist and co-lead vocalistTom DeLongeand drummer Scott Raynor. They released two albums – 1995’sCheshire Catand 1997’sDude Ranch– before Raynor was replaced withTravis Barker.
While Blink-182 already had some recognition in the music world, they found mainstream success in 1999 with the release of their first album with Barker,Enema of the State. According toNPR,Enema of the Statebecame their best-selling album and sold over 15 million records. In 2001, they released their follow-up record,Take Off Your Pants and Jacket, which is their second best-selling album. It reached number one on theBillboard200the week it debuted. Their only other album to hit number one on the charts wasCaliforniain 2016.
Blink-182 was initially slated to kick off their tour in March 2023 but wasforced to postponewhen Barker injured his finger twice in less than a month andneeded surgery. Instead, they hit the road in May 2023 — starting in Saint Paul, Minnesota — and will travel to Europe, Latin America and Australia.
On April 14, 2023, they made a surprise performance at Coachella after being added to the lineup just one day prior. This performance marked the first time the band’s most notable members had been onstage together since 2015. Theirhigh-energy set featured songslike “I Miss You,” “What’s My Age Again,” “All The Small Things” and the live debut of “Edging.”
Less than a week later, it was announced that Blink-182 would replaceFrank Oceanas the Sunday night headliner during weekend two of Coachella. Oceandropped out due to a leg injury.
In July 2023, DeLongespoke with Fenderabout the band’s upcoming music. “I still think we’re writing our best songs," he said. “I think our album coming out is probably our best album we’ve ever made.”
Here’s a look into the lives of the members of Blink-182, then and now.
Mark Hoppus, 51
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The bassist, co-lead vocalist and songwriter of Blink-182, Mark Hoppus, is the only member of the band to appear on every album they’ve released. He was born in Ridgecrest, California, on March 15, 1972.
The two formed Blink-182 in August 1992 and started playing gigs at punk clubs, according to theLos Angeles Times. After they signed a record deal with San Diego-based Cargo Records, the band released their first album,Cheshire Cat, in 1995. They switched to MCA Records for their second album,Dude Ranch, which came out in 1997.
In April 2021, Hoppus was diagnosed with stage 4 diffuse large B-cell lymphoma, andaccidentally revealed his the diagnosison Instagram when he posted a photo of himself in a chemotherapy chair that June. The musician underwent five months of treatment before he was declared cancer-free in September 2021.
After his diagnosis, Hoppus leaned heavily on his wife and mother, who received successful treatment for the same cancer in 2019. Hoppus told PEOPLE his wife gave him some tough love when he was first diagnosed, which helped him “snap out of it” and “do the work” to get better.
“She researched all the best foods, like, ‘This helps with the nausea, and this helps with the dehydration, and this helps with the recovery,’ " he said. “My wife was awesome from day one.”
His Blink-182 bandmates were also there for Hoppus during his cancer journey. When Barker and DeLonge heard about his diagnosis, theyvisited him at homebefore he started chemotherapy. “It was the first time that all three of us were in the same room in like five years,” Hoppus told PEOPLE. “It’s actually better than it used to be. There was no agenda. There were no lingering grudges. It felt very back to what it should be: three friends sitting in a room.”
A few months before Blink-182 announced their reunion in October 2022, Hoppus told PEOPLE he was open to getting the band back together. “I keep writing music, and I’m open to whatever the next phase of Blink is,” he said. “I’m hopeful for the future. I’m just damn glad to be here.”
Tom DeLonge, 47
DeLonge is a primary songwriter on the band’s first five albums —Cheshire Cat,Dude Ranch,Enema of the State,Take Off Your Pants and JacketandBlink-182. Known for his humorous lyrics, DeLonge jokingly told theLos Angeles Timesin 1999 he was “a poet” and “never had time to go to college or grow up or anything,” so that’s why he wrote “immature” lyrics.
“It’s always hard when you’re transitioning from something that you’ve worked your entire life, up to that point, to achieve, but the only two things on Earth — outside of my family — that I was interested in were music and this subject,” he told PEOPLE about leaving Blink-182 to pursue his interest in extraterrestrial life. “When I got brought into the arms of how the subject works, and what it is, it was a very easy choice.”
After years of minimal contact, DeLongereconnected with Hoppusin 2021 when he reached out to his former bandmate for help with a divorce paper and thus discovered his cancer diagnosis. “We weren’t really talking much at all, maybe once every couple of months, a little text here and there. But now, we talk multiple times a day,” DeLonge revealed in an interview with Apple Music 1’sZane Lowe. “We’ve been able to completely repair that friendship and really cut to the depth of who we are as people and what this is all about.”
Despite telling Lowe he “didn’t know if I was going to play music anymore” after leaving Blink-182 in 2015, DeLongeteased his returnto the band in August 2022. He posted a black-and-white throwback photo of the trio onInstagramand tagged the group in the caption. He officially revealed his return to the band two months later when Blink-182 announced their new single “Edging” and a 2023/2024 world tour.
Scott Raynor, 44
Jim Steinfeldt/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty ; Scott Raynor Instagram
The original drummer of Blink-182 was Scott Raynor, who was born in Poway, California, in 1978. He helped form the band after meeting DeLonge in high school. Raynor played for Blink-182 from 1992 to 1998 and was featured on the band’s first two albums,Cheshire CatandDude Ranch.
Travis Barker, 47
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Drummer, producer and songwriter Travis Barker was born in Fontana, California, on Nov. 14, 1975. When he was 4, his mom bought him his first drum kit, and he started lessons a year later,per Loudwire. He continued to use that same drum kit until he was 15.
Barker’s mother died from cancer when he was young. Speaking withVicein 2015, he recalled the last piece of career advice she gave him. “From the moment after my mom passed away, I really followed the last words she told me. ‘Play the drums and don’t care about anything else in life but doing the things you love,’ " he said. “I did that. I did it in an unforgiving way, I didn’t care what anyone told me, and my mind was made up. I almost felt like she was orchestrating things upstairs, I don’t know if it’s fate.”
Barker played in several punk rock bands before joining the Aquabats, a ska punk group, in 1994. He was featured on the band’s 1997 album,The Fury of the Aquabats!, and joined their tour with Blink-182 that same year. When Raynor left Blink-182 in 1998, DeLonge and Hoppus asked Barker to fill in on the drums, and he learned 20 of their songs in just 45 minutes.
The drummer’s first album with Blink-182 wasEnema of the State, which was released in 1999 and included their hit song “All The Small Things.” Barker has played on every album since then, includingBlink-182,NeighborhoodsandCalifornia.
Barker iscurrently marriedto reality starKourtney Kardashian, whom he wed in three different ceremonies in 2022. They made their first appearance as a blended family — Kardashian has three children with ex-boyfriendScott Disick— at the premiere ofThe Kardashiansin April 2022.
In August 2021, Barkertook his first plane ridein over a decade. He had not stepped on a plane since 2008 when he survived a deadly crash that killed four people and left Barker with third-degree burns on more than half of his body. The drummer toldNYLONin September 2021 that he wouldn’t have considered flying againwithout Kardashian’s support.
“It’s still something very new to me, but having something that gives me the strength and hope to be able to overcome things that were so traumatic in my life, it just says a ton,” he said. “She’s definitely that for me. I’m invincible when I’m with her. It’s just like I never dreamed, I never even considered flying again.”
In addition to drumming for Blink-182, Barker has made plenty of ventures outside of the band. He founded a clothing line, Famous Stars and Straps, in 1999, founded his own record label in 2019 named DTA Records and launched avegan wellness companycalled Barker Wellness in 2021.
Barker has also collaborated with many other artists, includingWillow Smith,Machine Gun Kellyand JXDN. He released his debut solo album in 2011 calledGive the Drummer Someand has experimented with a few other bands, namely +44 (a separate group he formed with Hoppus), TRV$DJAM (a duo he formed with late friend DJ AM) and The Transplants.
Known for his energetic drumming style,Rolling Stonenamed Barker one of their top 100 greatest drummers of all time in 2016. The outlet called him “an animalistic artist who performs fiercely and is unafraid to go theatrical.”
In 2018, Blink-182 was forced to cancel a small tour due toblood clots that were discoveredin both of Barker’s arms. More recently, the band had to postpone the Latin American leg of their 2023 world tour so Barker could have surgery on a smashed finger.
Matt Skiba, 47
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Matt Skiba was born in Chicago, Illinois, in 1976. According toVice, the musician was originally a drummer and played with several bands in his early days, including Blunt and The Jerkwaters. He made the switch to guitar and became the frontman of Alkaline Trio in 1996 when he helped form the band.
Over the years, they released nine studio albums and were even the opening act for Blink-182 in 2001 on theirTake Off Your Pants and Jackettour. Already familiar with the band, it wasn’t a hard decision for Skiba to accept an offer to replace DeLonge in Blink-182 after he left in 2015.
“I didn’t really have to think about it — the only thing I was juggling in my head was Alkaline Trio’s schedule,” he toldVulturein October 2022. “I was like, ‘It’s a pretty crazy idea, but if you guys think it’ll work, I’m down to give it a shot.’ "
Skiba was able to balance being in both Blink-182 and Alkaline Trio from 2015 to 2022. In addition to playing and singing on Blink-182’sCaliforniaandNine, he contributed to Alkaline Trio’s 2018 albumIs This Thing Cursed?and an EP calledE.P.in 2020. Most recently, Alkaline Trio performed at the When We Were Young festival in Las Vegas in October 2022.
When Blink-182 announced their reunion in October 2022, the news didn’t come as a shock to Skiba. Speaking withVulturetwo months later, the guitarist revealed that Hoppus had informed him they were in talks with DeLonge about returning to the band.
“What’s happened between Tom and his bandmates is between them. I really am genuinely glad, as a fan of the band, that they’re a family again,” he said. " I’m honored to have been asked to fill in for Tom or to join the band or however you want to phrase it. I’m proud of the work that I did with them. We had a great time … There’s no bad blood, there’s no drama, there’s no nothing. It’s just the next chapter in the band’s life.”
Skiba also shared his own message to the band onInstagramafter DeLonge thanked him publicly for filling in. In addition to congratulating the band, he expressed his thanks and said, “I am truly grateful for my time with blink and I am truly happy you guys are a band and a family again. THANKS TO THE BAND AND ALL THE BLINK FANS FOR HAVING ME. You were delicious!”
Skiba toldVulturethere is “almost a whole album’s worth of stuff” he worked on with Blink-182 before Delonge’s return but has “no idea” if that will ever come out and is now focused on his music with Alkaline Trio.
source: people.com
