What Is Pop-punk?

History and Culture
Pop-punk, is a fusion of two main music genres of 'punk rock' and 'pop music.' When brought together the combined genres create pop-sounding melodies with speedy punk tempo's, pounding drums and loud guitars. The first bands to break through the scene and make the new hybrid genre known, were such bands as Green Day (1987) and Blink182 (1992).

As you can see from the above images, the first bands to establish the 'pop-punk' genre were perhaps not in alignment with most of society. The picture of Blink182 (second picture) shows 3 men who all have their tops off, are all pulling immature faces and two of which have many in-your-face tattoo's. Tattoo's have been increasingly more acossiated with rebelion against society or even parents, which is often what the culture of the genre is about; non-conformity, rebellion and just having fun.

Through recent years, these ethics and morals have been carried with every new band that breaks the scene. Every band however, has their own set of morals and teachings to get through to their fans, through lyrics. More recently pop-punk bands such as Man Overboard, The Story So Far and Transit, are focused on thoughts and feelings of ex-girlfriends/boyfriends, family, friends and society in general who have hurt or disarded them in some way or another, through bitter feelings of discontent.

An example of lyrics which talk angrily about someone, comes from the song 'Rally Cap' by The Story So Far(TSSF);

''You leave me in the deep end with ankles made of bricks, But I'm used to dealing with crooks and p***ks, they fill the minutes while the clock ticks.'' 

According to TSSF frontman, Parker cannon the song is about friends who just leave you without explanation and leave you to deal with everything on your own. It is also about having to deal with 'fake-people' those who want to bring you down. This is a common theme throughout modern pop-punk, those who sing in bands within the genre are usually have lyrics about past experiences that have upset them, people they hate or even feelings about themselves. I believe for the most part, if you attend a pop-punk concert you will experience a sense of 'family' as everyone is there to enjoy the same thing, perhaps people share similar experiences, they are alike.