With Tom Delonge having enjoyed critical success with his post Blink offering Angels & Airwaves, it’s now turn for the other two thirds of the arguably most successful pop punk band of our generation to step up to the plate.
Frontman Mark Hoppus and drummer Travis Barker have teamed up with Craig Fairbaugh (who already played with Barker in Transplants) and Shane Gallagher (The Nervous Return), and bought onboard bought Blink producer Jerry Finn as executive producer, to create an album that maintains the best elements of Blink, but is slashed through with a darker, most progressive electronic sound.
Debut single ‘Lycanthrope‘ was debuted on Tony Hawks Project 8 Xbox game, and whilst there’s no escaping that Hoppus’s vocal will forever bring you back to Blink tracks about banging the neighbour and the girl at the rock show – this is like Blink all grown up. Hoppus remarks “We’re not divorcing ourselves from the past, but we are pushing beyond..” The sound is more mature, Jerry Finn’s concocted a masterpiece of a mix, with keyboards, electronic drums and a gently throbbing bassline caressing a catchy but not cheesy chorus. As Barker himself puts it “If Blink was the daytime, Plus 44 is the nighttime.”
This is in exciting debut from a band who are moving and growing, Hoppus and Barker have maintained the accessibility of Blink, but +44 is darker and edgier. If you thought you’d outgrown Blink shrug this on for size – after all, what’s not to love about a band named after the UK dialling code?
The album “When Your Heart Stops Beating” is released on 13th November.