Thanks so much! And you're right, I often do have good ears. I'm so glad you pointed me towards this new band. Personally, I consider Blink 182 to be a punk band as well as its side-projects. I know, I know, many punk fans have turned their backs on Blink and consider punk to be more a state of mind rather than a style of music.
I feel that just because Blink manages to have harmony and melody in their music and singing, they shouldn't be lumped in as an emo band or whatever. The only concert I've ever been to was a Blink 182 concert. Their music makes me feel so many different things besides just destruction of property and rage against authority.
There seems to be a heart to that music. Listening to the words to Adam's Song, the piano in Stay Together For The Kids, the vocal harmony at the end of Feeling This or the melancholy love letter at war time being read in Violence.... They deserve so much more than to be written off as "same crappy punk music".
Perhaps I'm wrong. Perhaps they're not simply a punk band. Maybe they never were for some people. All I know is, whatever you want to call it, I find it to be haunting, sad and uplifting music most of the time. If punk fans can't appreciate that and are even against music that can do that, even for just one person, then well, it makes me a bit sad. I like punk music, but then again, I guess I just don't know what real punk is. Oh well.
Thanks again.
-John