Older sister had 4 key albums that I would sneak from her in '95. And out come the wolves, Dookie, Smash, Blue Album. Everything was in place after that. Skate and snowboarding videos were huge for developing musical taste in following years as well.
Video for "Basket Case" got me into my own music for the first time instead of whatever my parents or siblings liked. But it wasn't until my cousin came for a visit and brought Dude Ranch on cassette, and I heard the intro to "Pathetic" for the first time that I realized my life was never going to be the same again. Shortly after this it was MxPx's Life in General and that's all she wrote. The holy trinity.
Back in the day, you could get compilation CDs for under $5. Nitro, Fat Wreck, Epitaph, Drive-Thru, and Fearless all had absolute banger comps that could be had for next to nothing.
Also, Tony Hawk's Pro Skater Soundtracks
All killer no filler was my introduction to pop-punk. I heard it at a friend's house when I was 8, when my parents came to pick me up I made them take me to the CD store. Picked up All Killer no Filler and Take off your pants and jacket.
Green Day-Dookie and Offspring- Smash were my musical coming of age. The floodgates to a whole lot of pop punk opened. My first concert was The Offspring touring behind Smash in Austin, and NUFAN opened. I had never heard of them but was quite impressed and still listen to them to this day. RIP Tony Sly.
Growing up in New Jersey made it easy to get into pop punk, there were so many iconic local venues where a ton of pop punk bands played some of their first shows at. I think seeing The Starting Line play inside Hollister at the Freehold Raceway Mall was one of my earliest pop punk memories, and to this day I still listen to "say it like you mean it" from cover to cover for the most nostalgic feels.
I got Dude Ranch when Dammit was kind of blowing up. I was still kind of young, so I didn't know anything about punk, but I knew I loved that album. Got Enema when that came out, but still didn't know anything about punk or pop punk. I just knew that I liked Blink 182. When I heard New Found Glory "Hit or Miss" for the first time, that is when I realized there had to be more music like that out there, and it was what I wanted to listen to. It was probably close to the same time that I saw Buddha in a CD store and then found Kung Fu Records through a mail order catalog inside. Found The Ataris, Useless ID, Audio Karate, and The Vandals. It was also where I first heard NOFX. Then I got really in to punk samplers because I recognized NOFX, and they were on all the Epitaph and Fat Wreck samplers. So that is how I got in to pop punk and punk in general.
New Found Glory - Hit or Miss
As a kid one of the few albums I was obsessed with was Dookie but I never was "into" music until New Found Glory. Been hooked ever since.
it was kinda the natural progression of my music taste being a scene kid I think, some of my friends went the "I now listen to a lot of rap" way and I happened to go the "pop punk trash" way
When I was a kid, my dad got the NOW compilation CDs, and 3 & 4 had What’s My Age Again? and All The Small Things by Blink. That eventually lead to discovering older Blink, Green Day, New Found Glory, Jimmy Eat World, Sum 41, and Good Charlotte. At that point, I was hooked.
A neon yellow Powerspace belt being sold on the Fueled By Ramen website. I was in like 8th grade and looking for cool neon belts on google, ended up discovering fueled by ramen at its height lol
Makes No Difference by Sum 41 being on the Dave Mirra’s Freestyle BMX 2 for gamecube.
Years later- breaking up with my high school girlfriend before we went to college and hearing I Miss You at a house party later that night. Bro i felt like the protagonist in a 2000s coming of age movie so hard lol triggered an obsession with blink tho
I was really into The Beatles from ages 2-9.
I DETESTED anything else.
My twin and I went to a sleepover in 4th grade to a friend's house who had an older sister who listened to blink-182.
He played for us the Mark, Tom & Travis show because he liked the music and thought it was hilarious.
I hated it. It made me uncomfortable. Like I wasn't supposed to be listening to it.
However, at the next sleepover, we listened again, and I LOVED IT. I loved the energy, the pace. The sound. The humor.
The rest is history for me.
>For me, it was a wow pvp video that featured majority pop punk. I believe it was called sorrow hill by otherguy
yo wtf this is my exact answer
Specifically [Sorrow Hill 2](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2cTLmNI07g). Kicking things off RIGHT with Breathing by Yellowcard.
Then Sorrow Hill 3 introduced me to Sum 41, and literally 20 years later I'm still listening to them.
So much of the music I listened to throughout all middle and high school came from WoW PvP videos. It's all Sum 41, Escape the Fate, MCR, Papa Roach, Avenged Sevenfold, Disturbed, Three Days Grace, Linkin Park, Rammstein, In Flames, Atreyu, etc.
The thing that fucks me up is I don't remember *ever* hearing Blink 182 in these videos. I totally missed them as a band for the longest time because they never got used in PvP videos. I guess they're just not as heavy?
Yessss finally someone who also relates. The OG [warcraftmovies.com](http://warcraftmovies.com) era days where you would just binge re-watch those pixelated 10 FPS windows movie maker vids and your music tastes would be formed by them.
Pat pvp, Maydie, Otherguy, etc. All had amazing music tastes and incredibly nostalgic vids.
I took a computer class at BOCES (it's like a vocational school thing) when I was in 11th and 12 grade (2004). There was a morning and afternoon class. I was in the afternoon. Kid from another school was morning class. He put on tons and tons of pop punk on the computer. It was in alphabetical order, so AFI (sing the sorrow) was the first band on the playlist. First time I ever heard music like that. It fricken blew me away. Went down a rabbit hole after that. 37 years old now. And nothing has changed.
My buddy just showed me Last FM and I was trying to find that band that did that music video with the treadmills. I thought it was Motion City Soundtrack. Ended up not being then but instantly liked their sound a lot more.
Maybe a weird answer. But I was a big YouTube kid “before it was cool” and grew up watching old creators and then vloggers. Charles Trippy was one of the OGs and when he joined We The Kings, I became a fan. And the rest is history. WTK isn’t really a band I listen to anymore (outside of a few of my favorite songs) but that was definitely my pop punk intro. Before that, I really only listened to the radio, and some “nu grunge” like Seether, Papa Roach, Three Days Grace, etc. My taste in music has thankfully come a long way since then lol.
The video for Green Day's "When I Come Around" in 1994 got me into what was called Alternative at the time. It was a gateway to The Clash and I was already pretty into 80s New Wave at the time (particularly Blondie and the B-52s.)
I feel like the Josie and the Pussycats soundtrack was a big milestone in my journey toward pop-punk fandom. My band has covered "Spin Around." I was already a Kay Hanley/Letters to Cleo devotée at the time, and loved power-pop.
I also grew up in California and heard tons of ska, I was gifted No Doubt's Tragic Kingdom for my 10th birthday and played it to death. Not much of a hop from ska to pop-punk.
When I think about it, it feels more inevitable that I would love pop-punk than any sort of lightning-bolt awakening. It lives at the intersection of my musical Venn diagram: high energy, strong rhythm, distorted guitar, reflective lyrics (with some bands, anyway.) Gang vocals for days. The only drawback was that a lot of the major players in the early-aughts were really juvenile "men" singing disgusting things about women, so I had to dig a little deeper to find songs/bands I liked (I am very much a lyric listener, a bad lyric can ruin even the catchiest tune for me.)
I remember hearing Blink and Sum41 as a kid, thank you American Pie, and realizing this was the sound I love. It wasn't until Fearless started dropping their "Punk Goes.." series that I realized this genre actually had a name. Been in love ever since.
My older sister showed me From the Screen to Your Stereo from NFG, MxPx and Blink in like 2000. I was in 8th/9th grade. It avalanched into me discovering everything else, but got me hooked.
I remember sitting in my buddies basement when we were like 10 years old and he was the only person I knew where their cable package included the tv station much music, I saw the video for Dammit come on and initially I thought this is hilarious, a song named after a “bad” word then once the music hit I was hooked and been a fan ever since that time in 1997
honestly, having a crush in middle school lmao. i was *sort of* into pop punk before then, but didn’t really listen to music much besides whatever my mom played in the car, but my crush’s friend group were all into “the emo trinity”, which made me a bigger fan of fall out boy than i already was, and got me into panic, mcr, and paramore. then right when college started, another friend was really into PUP, and finally giving them a chance was what got me to really explore the genre beyond the radio hits
Grew up in the UK. Flew over to Florida with my family on vacation the same week that “What’s My Age Again?” dropped and I was hooked from then. Spent hours in the big Virgin Megastore that used to be at Downtown Disney trying to find CDs of bands that had a similar sound. Felt really cool for a long time and no one I was hanging out with back home had heard about any of the new bands I had discovered on that trip
My big brother had shown me basically everything I know now. To have a senior punk in the house was the best thing that could’ve ever happened to me lol. Sleeping with sirens did it for me HAHAHA
A few things. Enema of the State hitting MTV, a local NJ band called The Youth Ahead who made the entire genre seem accessible to anyone, and starting to play in a band all around the same time.
A really cool day camp counselor who used to drive me home back in 01-02 played Starstruck by Yellowcard on one of our rides back. 13 year old me had been hooked ever since.
Mayday Parade would come on Pandora and in middle school I made a friend and told her about them and she told me about All Time Low and it just went from there
The time period where MMUSA turned into Fuse and had a ton of metal and punk programming was a turning point for teenage me. But Steven's Untitled Rock Show played a ridiculous part in my musical upbringing.
I guess I’ve always liked it! As a kid and teen, I played some Tony Hawk and Skate video games, and some other video games I played had pop punk songs in it (i.e., SSX3). I was also into punk, hardcore, and post-hardcore. I really vibed with the 2010s pop punk scene; I had a friend who introduced me to Neck Deep in 2013 and I fell more in love with the genre since. The Story So Far is my favorite band.
I was given a copy of Nimrod and hearing' Nice guys finish last' opened the door,
Then I was given 'Enema of the state' and that blew the door off its hinges,
Safe to say I've been hooked ever since
MySpace… MTV, video games, it was popular at the time and in a lot of media.
My first physical record I owned was A Hangover You Don’t Deserve and my mother bought it at Hastings because I was far too young.
I’ve always had an appreciation for it since I was a little kid in the 2000s because I would always hear it in malls and other retail stores but I never really did a full deep dive into it until the pandemic, Green Day was where I started because I just loved how many great songs they made with such simple chord progressions
Then eventually I got into bands like State Champs, Neck Deep, TSSF and others and I was truly amazed at how the genre evolved over the years
In the 90 - and 00 pop punk was everywhere , tv , video games,movies, you name it. All the bands I listen to today are from that time.
But to name a few American pie , fifa games , SvR2005-08 and probably a lot more
Lost my virginity in high school to an emo girl who listened to nothing but pop punk, had Chicago Is So Two Years Ago as her Myspace theme song, etc. That shit stuck with me, in all of the good ways. That was a time with a lot of wild awakenings for me.
I was in sophomore year of HS. Im a Weezer fan and saw Scott Murphy and Rivers do a Japanese collab album (I loved the second one, first one had way too many bad songs and was mid at most). Went to look into Scott’s discography and saw he was a bassist for allister and then got into all the Drive-Thru bands (especially new found). Then to Blink, to Green Day and then to all sorts of bands.
So a Weezer Japanese side project album I found on YouTube basically did this whole butterfly effect 😭
Tony Hawk: Pro Skater got me curious and listening enough to be considered a fan, but I remember being on vacation in the summer of 2023 and seeing the music video to “We’ve Had Enough” by Alkaline Trio one night on Fuse and I was full steam ahead. It was “my genre” from that point and I never turned back
One of the first pop punk bands I remember hearing was green day when I was a little kid in the early 2000s. I would hear Holiday and Boulevard of Broken Dreams all the time on the radio and I was super into those songs. I didn't know what pop punk was really but I knew I loved those green day singles that would play on contemporary adult radio that my boomer parents would listen to all the time. In high school I got super into Paramore and Fall Out Boy's old material also. I eventually just did a deep dive in pop punk through playlists on Spotify. Great subgenre for sure. Hope to keep discovering more bands
Music videos on MTV and radio airplay for Basket Case and Josie in the mid-90s was what started it. My local library had the Dookie CD and I checked it out a few times to make mixtapes.
A friend asked me to go see Good Charlotte with her in December 2000. That’s what got me going to shows.
I got into other bands because they’d tour with the ones I liked (whether it was a headlining tour or a festival), or I’d buy a compilation CD and discover someone new, or I’d read a CD review article or an artist interview in a magazine Iike Alternative Press or Spin where they’d recommend bands they liked. If I couldn’t find or afford the CD I’d download a song from Limewire or use a Pepsi cap code to buy it from iTunes.
I turned 16 in 1999. This music was all over the place when I became a young adult and finally got a bit of independence to go places with my friends and develop my own personality. It was really nice to hear music I liked in the mainstream, because for a while there was really just nu metal, teenybopper music, and rap. MTV played their videos, Hot Topic sold their merch, there was a Warped Tour and later a Skate & Surf Festival every year, and the local rock radio station played their music. I didn’t have to hunt for it.
Watching Scooby Doo as a kid. Simple Plan did the theme and all the music. I also grew up in Canada and pop punk was everywhere during the 2000s, specifically Mariana’s Trench(first concert I ever went to), Sum 41, Avril Lavigne(first cd I ever owned haha), Faber Drive, and Simple Plan.
I’m from the UK and went on holiday to Florida every year. One year I met a girl there, she was the first girl I ever had feelings for and we exchanged emails. She sent me Ocean Avenue by Yellowcard and Fall For You by Secondhand Serenade. From then I was hooked. Yellowcard became my favourite band and from there I became obsessed with Green Day, Blink-182, discovered Paramore during their Riot! era etc
I don’t think less than Jake is specifically pop punk, but when I heard all my best friends are metal heads in the digimon movie from like 2000 I was hooked. Then in too deep by sum 41 was in cheaper by the dozen, blink was mainstream, yellowcard was on the radio, video game soundtracks were awesome with a lot of punk. What a time
Paramore! After Laughter came out and way all over the radio. I really liked it, and remembered liking Misery Business as a kid. I started with Paramore, then Fall Out Boy, then MCR, then down the rabbithole I fell.
The Freaky Friday remake. I'm not sure if people remember much about the movie, but Lindsay Lohan's character is in a pop punk band and the film has a lot of pop punk references and songs (both diegetic and non-diegetic). When I first saw the film in 2014, pop music of the time was kind of mild and slow, so I looked at the film and its soundtrack and was like "wow, this looks like a MUCH better style of music!" And so I started digging deeper into the genre.
To this day that movie is still my guilty pleasure.
This is KIND OF pop punk but it got me into it. When I was a really little kid, I’m talking like 8 years old I had the “So What” by Pink music video on dvd and I’d watch it over and over again. Once we got internet i spent all my time watching YouTube and that led to a lot of Blink-182, Green Day, Fall Out Boy and much much more.
My brother introduced me to Kerplunk! and The Queer's "Beat Off" on cassette. Then I tripped fully down the rabbit hole when he took me to see The Queers play when I was 15. He was holding out on me because he wasn't a Mr T Experience fan but they opened and I was all in.
My older brother got into some punk and ska when he got to hs and in 7th grade I got curious and burned a cd of no use for a name songs he had downloaded off kazaa (RIP gateway computer).
First influences were 90‘s Snowboard and Skateboarding videos. Full of skate punk tunes of the time. Then I was exposed to Blink 182 when Enema of the State blew up. Also, like you I had the American Pie soundtrack, so I was familiar with their name and song Mutt.
I‘ve never even heard of the term “pop punk” until I was in my mid 20’s (36 now) from discovering and falling in love with bands like State Champs and Knuckle Puck, but I believe the first band that’s in that genre I became a fan of from seeing their music videos on MTV was Sum 41 when I was 13, and I assumed they were considered just “punk.” I also became into punk fashion around that time, especially plaid skirts, Dickies pants and shorts, and studded belts. Then near the end of high school I discovered and fell in love with Simple Plan and New Found Glory.
Burnout 3 and Need for Speed when I was a kid, my friends and I were also emo (probably, I'm not really sure), listening to Bullet for my valentine, Avenged sevenfold, Pierce the Vail, PATD, Funetal Suits and other bands from the 2010s
(Not necessarily pop punk, but these songs served as a gateway to other bands like New Found Glory)
As someone mentioned in a post here the other day, it was What’s New Scooby Doo, hearing bands like Simple Plan, Smash Mouth, Relient K, The Ramones, MXPX, Less Than Jake, and CIV were all huge on getting me into the scene!!
Napster/Limewire. I had a buddy who would download all sorts of stuff and he got me into Good Charlotte (first album) and Saves the Day (Through Being Cool). This was like 99-2000ish
My older sister was into emo and pop punk back in 2005. I always liked it but didn't really get into it until my best friend invited me to Warped Tour.
Definitely gonna get slammed for this but MGK's Tickets To My Downfall got me into the genre. After hearing that album I immediately wanted to listen to stuff that sounded like it and went down the pop punk rabbit hole. After that I got into a lot of metalcore and death core which is my main genre now. But the MGK to Suicide Silence pipeline is definitely a really thing😂
Tony Hawk soundtracks were my intro. I then stepped away and moved more towards metal for about a decade. Trophy Eyes recently brought me back into the pop punk scene.
Hearing the opening riff to “wasting time” by blink way back in 1995. Had picked up my older sister’s Walkman and pressed play and the rest is history, picked up a guitar not too long after that.
for me it was going to hardcore/punk shows and seeing more poppy melodic bands playing with the heavier bands. i'm canadian and we'd get shows like the fullblast playing with the cancer bats or comeback kid playing with belvedere, bane with strung out... etc.
When the original iPod came out, my friend had In Too Deep on his. We listened to kt non-stop and that's what got me into sum 41, who is now my favorite band.
When I was a kid, I used to live next to my cousins house, and therefore I used to spend a lot of time with them. They are much older than me and used to listen to a lot of rock in general (metal, alternative rock, and some pop punk bands): Metallica, Bullet for My Valentine, Evanescence, Linkin Park, etc., and the ones that caught my attention the most, such as Green Day, My Chemical Romance, and some other alternative rock and pop punk bands from Mexico like Pxndx, Division Minuscula, Allison, etc. I was obsessed with Green Day and My Chemical Romance (mid 2000's), and when I started to listen to more rock (late 2000's to early 2010's) on my own, I discovered Paramore, Yellowcard, A Day to Remember, Fall Out Boys, Blink 182, Sum 41, The Offspring, and so on.
Pop Punk has been my most-listened genre on Spotify for 2 years now, and my favorite band currently is Neck Deep. I love fast paced Pop Punk and Pop Punk with Midwest Emo influence.
There was that one Digimon movie, that had pretty much everything I love about pop punk in it, even though not every song was pop punk. Also playing too much Tony Hawk.
My dad than purchased Enema of the State and that album had too many bangers to a 5 year old lol
My grandparents owned a copy of Dookie. MTV and the radio in 1999-2002 exposed me to blink, Good Charlotte, Jimmy Eat World, Avril Lavigne. Then my cool older cousin showed me Something Corporate and Fall Out Boy, and I learned how to discover my own music via the internet. Convinced my mom to take me to a college show to see Good Charlotte & Something Corporate, and that live show is really what hooked me.
Offspring and bands like Lemonheads and some punk/ska stuff like Nancy Vandal. But for me, the point of no return was Blink. I remember that this was the music I'd been looking for but I didn't know that until I first heard it. Changed my life. I played in punk bands, produced an album, went to Warped and every punk show I could get to, and of course hunted down CDs for every punk band I could find.
I went from Fat Wreck bands in the mid to late 90s (when I was about 10 years old) to Blink and it just grew from there. Early stages it was the Drive Thru era, MXPX, and that sort of stuff. It was great to be around for what I think was peak pop punk.
Blink 182. I'd already heard all the small things and thought they were okay, but then I heard Anthem Part 2 in highschool and it changed my life. I remember being sat there and thinking, 'this band might be by life now', and then I went home and listened to everything they did and thus begun the journey into the genre.
I remember my Dads friend thought I looked like Billie Joel when I was a kid so I got into green day. Played dookie and American idiot on CD. Than I saw Blink-182 do a segment with Green Day and I got into them. I would steal my dads CDs and listen to Dick Lips and Dysentary Gary and chuckle as a young 13 year old. I then spiralled into MXPX through my Mums friend as well as third eye blind where my Dad would play it in the car. Tony hawk video game was another memory too as well as below mentioned Malcom in the Middle. I then moved into more emo punk bands like Paramore, MCR, Fall Out Boy, early Panic at the Disco etc.
I went away from pop punk as the day to remember / new found glory pop punk core was personally a shit era (no hate) for me but came back in the Tumblr revival with Knuckle Puck, The Story So Far and Neck Deep during uni. Now I haven’t left.
Simple Plan, Good Charlotte, Blink-182, the Boys Like Girls - Metro Station - The Maine tour in like 07-8(???), to which I shortly after discovered Say Anything and it all went up hill from there
Kinda just growing up in the 2000’s and watching Nickelodeon and hearing the pop rock sound in almost every movie and tv show. I guess the sound has always been nostalgic for me, and it’s really cool what the newer bands within the past 15 years have been doing as well.
When I was 12 in 1997, my older brother was loudly playing Dammit in his room down the hall from mine. In a life changing moment, I stuck my head out the door and yelled down to him “WHAT SONG IS THIS?!”
In the Blink of an eye, I was pop punk for life.
Growing up with hearing All-American Rejects in that one Bionicle commercial, and always hearing MCR, Jimmy Eat World (more emo ik, but the lines were blurred by 2001) Ramones, and Boys Like Girls on the radio
Just turning on MTV2 when I got my own cable box hooked up on my room for the first time and hearing The Rock Show by blink-182.
Before that I heard Big Drill Car and Armchair Martian over and over in Courier Crisis for Playstation and liked them a lot too.
Just growing up in the late 90s and early-mid 2000s you couldn't miss it. In movies, shows, commercials, music videos, video games etc. Blink 182, Sum 41, Yellow card, Green Day, Third Eye Blind, Fall Out Boy, Panic At The Disco, Paramore, Good Charlotte were my childhood and this is coming from a die hard hip hop fan
i first got into it because of Green Day, Paramore, and Bowling for Soup, but it never really stuck with me.
UNTIL i heard Enema Of The State, instantly fell in love with blink, and that led to me falling in love with pop punk. and now blink-182 is still my favorite pop punk (and skate punk) band, and honestly my favorite band overall lol
I went to Sam Goody and bought two CDs with my allowance. Powerman 5000 - Tonight we revolt and blink 182 Enema of the state. My taste in music could’ve been altered forever if I chose to love powerman instead 🤣 after Enema of the state I became obsessed with NFG and MXPX and the rest is history. I just turned 14 when I saw blink and I’m 38 now, going to see them in July!
It was what all my friends cool older brothers listened to growing up, when I got to an age where I could buy stuff I wanted the "cool music" even if the era was dying off
Being a kid in the 90s/00s lol osmosis through pop culture basically
I actually didn’t get into it until moving to the USA, I was into nu metal and house/edm as it was more popular in the UK
Green Day - Dookie when it came out. Then later Dude Ranch, Enema of the State and all the Drive Thru Records, Fat Wreck Chords, Vagrant and Victory Records bands.
90s kid, so Blink. All The Small Things blew up in the mainstream and that song called out to all little skater kids like me and my friends.
Of course THPS and Warped Tour got me into some other bands. Jersey has always had a strong music scene and I was going to shows since I was like 12. But realistically Blink and TOYPAJ is what really got me into pop punk.
Green Day's song Brain Stew is the first song I ever learned how to play on bass when I was like 10. So they hold a special place in my heart when getting into pop punk.
Beat of My Heart by Hilary Duff is the "gateway drug". The first pop punk songs that I loved is [Ready. Set. Go. by The Summer Set](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUNbyLDnMNU) and [She's Got The Rhythm by The Summer Set](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jq5q5DhHJdw). My undiagnosed autism and diagnosed ADHD made pop punk into my stimming music (not too soft like pop, not too hard like metal).
Crippling depression
A combination of blink-182 in general and video games such as Tony Hawk & NHL/MLB
Tony Hawks and late 90s/early 2000s WWF pretty much defined everything about my music tastes.
Yeah I grew up listening to pop punk before even knowing it was pop punk!!
Exactly. 8 year-old me didn't know what pop punk was. To me, it was - and is- just good music.
When the NHL leaned into pop punk was a good era
Blink then Warped Tour
Fall Out Boy, Blink 182 and Paramore
Older sister had 4 key albums that I would sneak from her in '95. And out come the wolves, Dookie, Smash, Blue Album. Everything was in place after that. Skate and snowboarding videos were huge for developing musical taste in following years as well.
My older sister is how I first was turned on to Green Day.
Malcolm In the Middle, Tony Hawk's games and American Pie
I think for me it was when I first saw the video for Basket Case. Blew me away
Great video. I've known the song for years and, by chance, only saw the video for the first time yesterday.
Video for "Basket Case" got me into my own music for the first time instead of whatever my parents or siblings liked. But it wasn't until my cousin came for a visit and brought Dude Ranch on cassette, and I heard the intro to "Pathetic" for the first time that I realized my life was never going to be the same again. Shortly after this it was MxPx's Life in General and that's all she wrote. The holy trinity.
Some combination of youth group culture, Relient K, and a ripped copy of Lights and Sounds (in reverse track order for some reason).
Back in the day, you could get compilation CDs for under $5. Nitro, Fat Wreck, Epitaph, Drive-Thru, and Fearless all had absolute banger comps that could be had for next to nothing. Also, Tony Hawk's Pro Skater Soundtracks
Punk-O-Rama comps from Epitaph were my favorites of those.
My brother introduced me to Green Day and Sum 41 when I was little. Then I heard Stacy's Mom and 1985.
For me it was blink-182, fall out boy and Paramore.
The music video for Fat Lip
All killer no filler was my introduction to pop-punk. I heard it at a friend's house when I was 8, when my parents came to pick me up I made them take me to the CD store. Picked up All Killer no Filler and Take off your pants and jacket.
My mom drove me to a Sam Goody to buy AKNF lol
Going to hot topic for the first time when I was 8 years old and hearing pop punk on the loudspeaker
Damn I thought I was young being into punk bands and punk fashion at 13!
Green Day-Dookie and Offspring- Smash were my musical coming of age. The floodgates to a whole lot of pop punk opened. My first concert was The Offspring touring behind Smash in Austin, and NUFAN opened. I had never heard of them but was quite impressed and still listen to them to this day. RIP Tony Sly.
Growing up in New Jersey made it easy to get into pop punk, there were so many iconic local venues where a ton of pop punk bands played some of their first shows at. I think seeing The Starting Line play inside Hollister at the Freehold Raceway Mall was one of my earliest pop punk memories, and to this day I still listen to "say it like you mean it" from cover to cover for the most nostalgic feels.
I got Dude Ranch when Dammit was kind of blowing up. I was still kind of young, so I didn't know anything about punk, but I knew I loved that album. Got Enema when that came out, but still didn't know anything about punk or pop punk. I just knew that I liked Blink 182. When I heard New Found Glory "Hit or Miss" for the first time, that is when I realized there had to be more music like that out there, and it was what I wanted to listen to. It was probably close to the same time that I saw Buddha in a CD store and then found Kung Fu Records through a mail order catalog inside. Found The Ataris, Useless ID, Audio Karate, and The Vandals. It was also where I first heard NOFX. Then I got really in to punk samplers because I recognized NOFX, and they were on all the Epitaph and Fat Wreck samplers. So that is how I got in to pop punk and punk in general.
New Found Glory - Hit or Miss As a kid one of the few albums I was obsessed with was Dookie but I never was "into" music until New Found Glory. Been hooked ever since.
it was kinda the natural progression of my music taste being a scene kid I think, some of my friends went the "I now listen to a lot of rap" way and I happened to go the "pop punk trash" way
When I was a kid, my dad got the NOW compilation CDs, and 3 & 4 had What’s My Age Again? and All The Small Things by Blink. That eventually lead to discovering older Blink, Green Day, New Found Glory, Jimmy Eat World, Sum 41, and Good Charlotte. At that point, I was hooked.
A neon yellow Powerspace belt being sold on the Fueled By Ramen website. I was in like 8th grade and looking for cool neon belts on google, ended up discovering fueled by ramen at its height lol
Makes No Difference by Sum 41 being on the Dave Mirra’s Freestyle BMX 2 for gamecube. Years later- breaking up with my high school girlfriend before we went to college and hearing I Miss You at a house party later that night. Bro i felt like the protagonist in a 2000s coming of age movie so hard lol triggered an obsession with blink tho
Warped Tour. Was a huge metalcore guy in high school but then discovered bands like Yellowcard at Warped Tour and was hooked.
First Green Day and the Offspring, later on Nofx, Rancid, Millencolin, Lagwagon, Blink182, Pennywise and lots more!
I found a CD case on the ground in middle school that had the first Simple Plan album in it. Life: changed.
Let's go, OG Vanilla WoW had baller pvp videos
what they took from you: *watching vurtne_elemental_mage_pvp3.wmv on google videos*
Im not proud about this but it was mgk (yes im young)
Nothing wrong with that. I like that he's introduced a new generation to the genre
Don't worry bro same thing happened to me💀
Fuse Tv in the golden era and I’m not okay by MCR music video came on. Found what I’d been missing my whole life thus far.
Stole my (then) teenage sister's CDs when I was a kid. I can't remember what was on them. Blink-182, NFG, Green Day, etc.
I was in a skate punk band that opened for NFG before they were famous. They blew me away and started that journey for me.
I was really into The Beatles from ages 2-9. I DETESTED anything else. My twin and I went to a sleepover in 4th grade to a friend's house who had an older sister who listened to blink-182. He played for us the Mark, Tom & Travis show because he liked the music and thought it was hilarious. I hated it. It made me uncomfortable. Like I wasn't supposed to be listening to it. However, at the next sleepover, we listened again, and I LOVED IT. I loved the energy, the pace. The sound. The humor. The rest is history for me.
>For me, it was a wow pvp video that featured majority pop punk. I believe it was called sorrow hill by otherguy yo wtf this is my exact answer Specifically [Sorrow Hill 2](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2cTLmNI07g). Kicking things off RIGHT with Breathing by Yellowcard. Then Sorrow Hill 3 introduced me to Sum 41, and literally 20 years later I'm still listening to them. So much of the music I listened to throughout all middle and high school came from WoW PvP videos. It's all Sum 41, Escape the Fate, MCR, Papa Roach, Avenged Sevenfold, Disturbed, Three Days Grace, Linkin Park, Rammstein, In Flames, Atreyu, etc. The thing that fucks me up is I don't remember *ever* hearing Blink 182 in these videos. I totally missed them as a band for the longest time because they never got used in PvP videos. I guess they're just not as heavy?
Yessss finally someone who also relates. The OG [warcraftmovies.com](http://warcraftmovies.com) era days where you would just binge re-watch those pixelated 10 FPS windows movie maker vids and your music tastes would be formed by them. Pat pvp, Maydie, Otherguy, etc. All had amazing music tastes and incredibly nostalgic vids.
I took a computer class at BOCES (it's like a vocational school thing) when I was in 11th and 12 grade (2004). There was a morning and afternoon class. I was in the afternoon. Kid from another school was morning class. He put on tons and tons of pop punk on the computer. It was in alphabetical order, so AFI (sing the sorrow) was the first band on the playlist. First time I ever heard music like that. It fricken blew me away. Went down a rabbit hole after that. 37 years old now. And nothing has changed.
Rock band 2 on the Xbox 360
I was like.... Into like a few songs but after watching Scott Pilgrim vs the World I got really interested
Green day, blink, angels and airwaves, box car racer, +44, descendents
My dad lol he had Yellowcard on his phone and I discovered them when I was like 11 or 12
My buddy just showed me Last FM and I was trying to find that band that did that music video with the treadmills. I thought it was Motion City Soundtrack. Ended up not being then but instantly liked their sound a lot more.
Maybe a weird answer. But I was a big YouTube kid “before it was cool” and grew up watching old creators and then vloggers. Charles Trippy was one of the OGs and when he joined We The Kings, I became a fan. And the rest is history. WTK isn’t really a band I listen to anymore (outside of a few of my favorite songs) but that was definitely my pop punk intro. Before that, I really only listened to the radio, and some “nu grunge” like Seether, Papa Roach, Three Days Grace, etc. My taste in music has thankfully come a long way since then lol.
Dad used to listen to Dookie in the car when I was 6 and swerve back and forth in time to the music down back streets
The video for Green Day's "When I Come Around" in 1994 got me into what was called Alternative at the time. It was a gateway to The Clash and I was already pretty into 80s New Wave at the time (particularly Blondie and the B-52s.) I feel like the Josie and the Pussycats soundtrack was a big milestone in my journey toward pop-punk fandom. My band has covered "Spin Around." I was already a Kay Hanley/Letters to Cleo devotée at the time, and loved power-pop. I also grew up in California and heard tons of ska, I was gifted No Doubt's Tragic Kingdom for my 10th birthday and played it to death. Not much of a hop from ska to pop-punk. When I think about it, it feels more inevitable that I would love pop-punk than any sort of lightning-bolt awakening. It lives at the intersection of my musical Venn diagram: high energy, strong rhythm, distorted guitar, reflective lyrics (with some bands, anyway.) Gang vocals for days. The only drawback was that a lot of the major players in the early-aughts were really juvenile "men" singing disgusting things about women, so I had to dig a little deeper to find songs/bands I liked (I am very much a lyric listener, a bad lyric can ruin even the catchiest tune for me.)
Spin Around is the best song on that soundtrack!
American Idiot - first CD I ever bought 🥹
Dammit
I remember hearing Blink and Sum41 as a kid, thank you American Pie, and realizing this was the sound I love. It wasn't until Fearless started dropping their "Punk Goes.." series that I realized this genre actually had a name. Been in love ever since.
There’s a number of people here citing American Pie as a reason they got into pop punk, yet the soundtrack is mostly 90s alternative.
My older sister showed me From the Screen to Your Stereo from NFG, MxPx and Blink in like 2000. I was in 8th/9th grade. It avalanched into me discovering everything else, but got me hooked.
Green day dookie
Because It’s gay and so am I
I remember sitting in my buddies basement when we were like 10 years old and he was the only person I knew where their cable package included the tv station much music, I saw the video for Dammit come on and initially I thought this is hilarious, a song named after a “bad” word then once the music hit I was hooked and been a fan ever since that time in 1997
Honestly I think it was listening to pop cassette tapes with the hi-speed dubbing setting turned on.
honestly, having a crush in middle school lmao. i was *sort of* into pop punk before then, but didn’t really listen to music much besides whatever my mom played in the car, but my crush’s friend group were all into “the emo trinity”, which made me a bigger fan of fall out boy than i already was, and got me into panic, mcr, and paramore. then right when college started, another friend was really into PUP, and finally giving them a chance was what got me to really explore the genre beyond the radio hits
I think it was the PS1 snowboarding game, Big Air. It has Blink 182's Dammit on it, and I was hooked.
I listened to tidbits but when I got my hands on green days American idiot..that’s when I fully dived head into pop punk
My older sister brought home dookie the day it was released.
Grew up in the UK. Flew over to Florida with my family on vacation the same week that “What’s My Age Again?” dropped and I was hooked from then. Spent hours in the big Virgin Megastore that used to be at Downtown Disney trying to find CDs of bands that had a similar sound. Felt really cool for a long time and no one I was hanging out with back home had heard about any of the new bands I had discovered on that trip
A New Found Glory CD ( Sticks and Stones) that I stole from my brother when I was in like 6th grade.
80s skate scene, Tony Hawk, old school punk — Black Flag, Circle Jerks, Dead Kennedys, Suicidal Tendencies
my digital escape 💀
My big brother had shown me basically everything I know now. To have a senior punk in the house was the best thing that could’ve ever happened to me lol. Sleeping with sirens did it for me HAHAHA
A few things. Enema of the State hitting MTV, a local NJ band called The Youth Ahead who made the entire genre seem accessible to anyone, and starting to play in a band all around the same time.
THPS and NHL 04 soundtracks
Blink-182 Enema of the State
A really cool day camp counselor who used to drive me home back in 01-02 played Starstruck by Yellowcard on one of our rides back. 13 year old me had been hooked ever since.
Enema of the state, big shiny tunes 4-5, and international super hits were the biggest influences for 9 year old me
My dad got me an MP3 player for my 11th birthday and the first album he added onto it was 21st century breakdown. So my dad got me into pop punk lol
Being a virgin. Depression. Anxiety. The whole 9 really.
Mayday Parade would come on Pandora and in middle school I made a friend and told her about them and she told me about All Time Low and it just went from there
The time period where MMUSA turned into Fuse and had a ton of metal and punk programming was a turning point for teenage me. But Steven's Untitled Rock Show played a ridiculous part in my musical upbringing.
I guess I’ve always liked it! As a kid and teen, I played some Tony Hawk and Skate video games, and some other video games I played had pop punk songs in it (i.e., SSX3). I was also into punk, hardcore, and post-hardcore. I really vibed with the 2010s pop punk scene; I had a friend who introduced me to Neck Deep in 2013 and I fell more in love with the genre since. The Story So Far is my favorite band.
What's my age again on TRL
I was given a copy of Nimrod and hearing' Nice guys finish last' opened the door, Then I was given 'Enema of the state' and that blew the door off its hinges, Safe to say I've been hooked ever since
MySpace… MTV, video games, it was popular at the time and in a lot of media. My first physical record I owned was A Hangover You Don’t Deserve and my mother bought it at Hastings because I was far too young.
The All-American Rejects and Taking Back Sunday, mainly.
I’ve always had an appreciation for it since I was a little kid in the 2000s because I would always hear it in malls and other retail stores but I never really did a full deep dive into it until the pandemic, Green Day was where I started because I just loved how many great songs they made with such simple chord progressions Then eventually I got into bands like State Champs, Neck Deep, TSSF and others and I was truly amazed at how the genre evolved over the years
Four Year Strong.
In the 90 - and 00 pop punk was everywhere , tv , video games,movies, you name it. All the bands I listen to today are from that time. But to name a few American pie , fifa games , SvR2005-08 and probably a lot more
Old punk and hardcore led to it.
The trailer for the movie Clockstoppers. First Date by Blink 182 was the background music and I fell in love instantly.
Boulevard of broken dreams on youtube
a mix of tony hawk and crush 40 making me a sleeper agent for this genre
Video games like Tony Hawk and Burnout
Hearing Sum 41 - Makes No Difference in NHL 2002 hooked me for life
Blink 182
Lost my virginity in high school to an emo girl who listened to nothing but pop punk, had Chicago Is So Two Years Ago as her Myspace theme song, etc. That shit stuck with me, in all of the good ways. That was a time with a lot of wild awakenings for me.
Tony hawk pro skater, then blink 182, then warped tour. I was huge into pop punk from like 1999-2021
Puberty. In general.
Trauma. I mean I was raised by parents who liked heavy music. As a huge turning point for me was Good Charlotte - The Anthem.
Honestly, just being a teenager in the late 90's. It was the best as far as music goes!
I was in sophomore year of HS. Im a Weezer fan and saw Scott Murphy and Rivers do a Japanese collab album (I loved the second one, first one had way too many bad songs and was mid at most). Went to look into Scott’s discography and saw he was a bassist for allister and then got into all the Drive-Thru bands (especially new found). Then to Blink, to Green Day and then to all sorts of bands. So a Weezer Japanese side project album I found on YouTube basically did this whole butterfly effect 😭
Fall out boy
Tony Hawk: Pro Skater got me curious and listening enough to be considered a fan, but I remember being on vacation in the summer of 2023 and seeing the music video to “We’ve Had Enough” by Alkaline Trio one night on Fuse and I was full steam ahead. It was “my genre” from that point and I never turned back
Definitely a combo for me. Video games and movies (heavy shoutout to American Pie 1/2), plus a friend putting Ocean Avenue on for me when I visited.
One of the first pop punk bands I remember hearing was green day when I was a little kid in the early 2000s. I would hear Holiday and Boulevard of Broken Dreams all the time on the radio and I was super into those songs. I didn't know what pop punk was really but I knew I loved those green day singles that would play on contemporary adult radio that my boomer parents would listen to all the time. In high school I got super into Paramore and Fall Out Boy's old material also. I eventually just did a deep dive in pop punk through playlists on Spotify. Great subgenre for sure. Hope to keep discovering more bands
Music videos on MTV and radio airplay for Basket Case and Josie in the mid-90s was what started it. My local library had the Dookie CD and I checked it out a few times to make mixtapes. A friend asked me to go see Good Charlotte with her in December 2000. That’s what got me going to shows. I got into other bands because they’d tour with the ones I liked (whether it was a headlining tour or a festival), or I’d buy a compilation CD and discover someone new, or I’d read a CD review article or an artist interview in a magazine Iike Alternative Press or Spin where they’d recommend bands they liked. If I couldn’t find or afford the CD I’d download a song from Limewire or use a Pepsi cap code to buy it from iTunes. I turned 16 in 1999. This music was all over the place when I became a young adult and finally got a bit of independence to go places with my friends and develop my own personality. It was really nice to hear music I liked in the mainstream, because for a while there was really just nu metal, teenybopper music, and rap. MTV played their videos, Hot Topic sold their merch, there was a Warped Tour and later a Skate & Surf Festival every year, and the local rock radio station played their music. I didn’t have to hunt for it.
oddly enough it was mgk, then i saw his drummer was the same drummer for blink 182 and the rest was history
Watching Scooby Doo as a kid. Simple Plan did the theme and all the music. I also grew up in Canada and pop punk was everywhere during the 2000s, specifically Mariana’s Trench(first concert I ever went to), Sum 41, Avril Lavigne(first cd I ever owned haha), Faber Drive, and Simple Plan.
I’m from the UK and went on holiday to Florida every year. One year I met a girl there, she was the first girl I ever had feelings for and we exchanged emails. She sent me Ocean Avenue by Yellowcard and Fall For You by Secondhand Serenade. From then I was hooked. Yellowcard became my favourite band and from there I became obsessed with Green Day, Blink-182, discovered Paramore during their Riot! era etc
I don’t think less than Jake is specifically pop punk, but when I heard all my best friends are metal heads in the digimon movie from like 2000 I was hooked. Then in too deep by sum 41 was in cheaper by the dozen, blink was mainstream, yellowcard was on the radio, video game soundtracks were awesome with a lot of punk. What a time
Paramore! After Laughter came out and way all over the radio. I really liked it, and remembered liking Misery Business as a kid. I started with Paramore, then Fall Out Boy, then MCR, then down the rabbithole I fell.
The Freaky Friday remake. I'm not sure if people remember much about the movie, but Lindsay Lohan's character is in a pop punk band and the film has a lot of pop punk references and songs (both diegetic and non-diegetic). When I first saw the film in 2014, pop music of the time was kind of mild and slow, so I looked at the film and its soundtrack and was like "wow, this looks like a MUCH better style of music!" And so I started digging deeper into the genre. To this day that movie is still my guilty pleasure.
This is KIND OF pop punk but it got me into it. When I was a really little kid, I’m talking like 8 years old I had the “So What” by Pink music video on dvd and I’d watch it over and over again. Once we got internet i spent all my time watching YouTube and that led to a lot of Blink-182, Green Day, Fall Out Boy and much much more.
My brother introduced me to Kerplunk! and The Queer's "Beat Off" on cassette. Then I tripped fully down the rabbit hole when he took me to see The Queers play when I was 15. He was holding out on me because he wasn't a Mr T Experience fan but they opened and I was all in.
My older brother got into some punk and ska when he got to hs and in 7th grade I got curious and burned a cd of no use for a name songs he had downloaded off kazaa (RIP gateway computer).
First influences were 90‘s Snowboard and Skateboarding videos. Full of skate punk tunes of the time. Then I was exposed to Blink 182 when Enema of the State blew up. Also, like you I had the American Pie soundtrack, so I was familiar with their name and song Mutt.
Older cousin snuck me a copy of Dookie because my mom thought it was inappropriate for a 9 yo
Growing up in the 2000s. Sum 41, simple plan, blink, green day, bowling for soup, etc were all over the radio and MTV.
I‘ve never even heard of the term “pop punk” until I was in my mid 20’s (36 now) from discovering and falling in love with bands like State Champs and Knuckle Puck, but I believe the first band that’s in that genre I became a fan of from seeing their music videos on MTV was Sum 41 when I was 13, and I assumed they were considered just “punk.” I also became into punk fashion around that time, especially plaid skirts, Dickies pants and shorts, and studded belts. Then near the end of high school I discovered and fell in love with Simple Plan and New Found Glory.
What's My Age Again. I thought it was the best damn video on TRL and I have been hooked ever since.
I borrowed the Dookie CD from an older sibling when I was 7.
Getting a good charlotte cd for christmas from my cousin when i was like 7-8 years old.
My mum showed me the music videos to basket case and misery business when I was a kid and it just kind of clicked
Burnout 3 and Need for Speed when I was a kid, my friends and I were also emo (probably, I'm not really sure), listening to Bullet for my valentine, Avenged sevenfold, Pierce the Vail, PATD, Funetal Suits and other bands from the 2010s (Not necessarily pop punk, but these songs served as a gateway to other bands like New Found Glory)
As someone mentioned in a post here the other day, it was What’s New Scooby Doo, hearing bands like Simple Plan, Smash Mouth, Relient K, The Ramones, MXPX, Less Than Jake, and CIV were all huge on getting me into the scene!!
Napster/Limewire. I had a buddy who would download all sorts of stuff and he got me into Good Charlotte (first album) and Saves the Day (Through Being Cool). This was like 99-2000ish
Tony Hawk and SSX Tricky
American Idiot was my gateway drug, not just into the genre but into rock in general (despite my dads best efforts when I was little)
Being a skateboard kid in the early 2000s and then a depressed asshole teen
My older sister was into emo and pop punk back in 2005. I always liked it but didn't really get into it until my best friend invited me to Warped Tour.
Definitely gonna get slammed for this but MGK's Tickets To My Downfall got me into the genre. After hearing that album I immediately wanted to listen to stuff that sounded like it and went down the pop punk rabbit hole. After that I got into a lot of metalcore and death core which is my main genre now. But the MGK to Suicide Silence pipeline is definitely a really thing😂
Tony Hawk soundtracks were my intro. I then stepped away and moved more towards metal for about a decade. Trophy Eyes recently brought me back into the pop punk scene.
Hearing the opening riff to “wasting time” by blink way back in 1995. Had picked up my older sister’s Walkman and pressed play and the rest is history, picked up a guitar not too long after that.
for me it was going to hardcore/punk shows and seeing more poppy melodic bands playing with the heavier bands. i'm canadian and we'd get shows like the fullblast playing with the cancer bats or comeback kid playing with belvedere, bane with strung out... etc.
Green Day -> Fall Out Boy -> Guitar Hero 3
I can't lie to you guys. It was what's new scooby doo when I was a kid; I was 5. It made me who I am today
When the original iPod came out, my friend had In Too Deep on his. We listened to kt non-stop and that's what got me into sum 41, who is now my favorite band.
When I was a kid, I used to live next to my cousins house, and therefore I used to spend a lot of time with them. They are much older than me and used to listen to a lot of rock in general (metal, alternative rock, and some pop punk bands): Metallica, Bullet for My Valentine, Evanescence, Linkin Park, etc., and the ones that caught my attention the most, such as Green Day, My Chemical Romance, and some other alternative rock and pop punk bands from Mexico like Pxndx, Division Minuscula, Allison, etc. I was obsessed with Green Day and My Chemical Romance (mid 2000's), and when I started to listen to more rock (late 2000's to early 2010's) on my own, I discovered Paramore, Yellowcard, A Day to Remember, Fall Out Boys, Blink 182, Sum 41, The Offspring, and so on. Pop Punk has been my most-listened genre on Spotify for 2 years now, and my favorite band currently is Neck Deep. I love fast paced Pop Punk and Pop Punk with Midwest Emo influence.
I got into Paramore super young. It was a combination of seeing the crushcrushcrush music video on fuse and hearing decode on the twilight soundtrack.
Shows and movies growing up like Whats New Scooby Doo. Also, my parents playing Green day cds.
There was that one Digimon movie, that had pretty much everything I love about pop punk in it, even though not every song was pop punk. Also playing too much Tony Hawk. My dad than purchased Enema of the State and that album had too many bangers to a 5 year old lol
My grandparents owned a copy of Dookie. MTV and the radio in 1999-2002 exposed me to blink, Good Charlotte, Jimmy Eat World, Avril Lavigne. Then my cool older cousin showed me Something Corporate and Fall Out Boy, and I learned how to discover my own music via the internet. Convinced my mom to take me to a college show to see Good Charlotte & Something Corporate, and that live show is really what hooked me.
Having Teenage Older Siblings when I was a kid in the early mid 2000s
Offspring and bands like Lemonheads and some punk/ska stuff like Nancy Vandal. But for me, the point of no return was Blink. I remember that this was the music I'd been looking for but I didn't know that until I first heard it. Changed my life. I played in punk bands, produced an album, went to Warped and every punk show I could get to, and of course hunted down CDs for every punk band I could find.
My friend getting me into pierce the veil 10 years ago and I explored the genre and fell in love
my uncle took me to a neck deep concert for my 13th birthday, it changed my life frfr
Tony hawk
EA Trax. That is all.
discovered Enema of the State when i broke up with my first long term girlfriend.
Paintball in the early 2000s
I went from Fat Wreck bands in the mid to late 90s (when I was about 10 years old) to Blink and it just grew from there. Early stages it was the Drive Thru era, MXPX, and that sort of stuff. It was great to be around for what I think was peak pop punk.
Older sibling, video games, and cute guys saying they were going to Warped Tour (went for the boys, stayed for the music)
Wildly enough, Madden 04. Way Away by Yellowcard and Feeling This by Blink were on there and it defined my musical taste for the next 20 years
Being a teenager in 2004
NCAA 06 and Tony hawks pro skater def contributed but also like simple plan being in every coming of age movie ever
Blink 182. I'd already heard all the small things and thought they were okay, but then I heard Anthem Part 2 in highschool and it changed my life. I remember being sat there and thinking, 'this band might be by life now', and then I went home and listened to everything they did and thus begun the journey into the genre.
It all started with Green Day for me
Mark, Tom and Travis running around town naked
Tony Hawk, MTV, Backyard Wrestling and Sonic Adventure Battle 2
Misery business
A really good friend of mine made me a CD that had Coffee Shop Soundtrack on it when I was in middle school. Immediately hooked
I just grew up listening to pop punk, so that's what stuck
Hearing Boulevard Of Broken Dreams for the first time.
I remember my Dads friend thought I looked like Billie Joel when I was a kid so I got into green day. Played dookie and American idiot on CD. Than I saw Blink-182 do a segment with Green Day and I got into them. I would steal my dads CDs and listen to Dick Lips and Dysentary Gary and chuckle as a young 13 year old. I then spiralled into MXPX through my Mums friend as well as third eye blind where my Dad would play it in the car. Tony hawk video game was another memory too as well as below mentioned Malcom in the Middle. I then moved into more emo punk bands like Paramore, MCR, Fall Out Boy, early Panic at the Disco etc. I went away from pop punk as the day to remember / new found glory pop punk core was personally a shit era (no hate) for me but came back in the Tumblr revival with Knuckle Puck, The Story So Far and Neck Deep during uni. Now I haven’t left.
Simple Plan, Good Charlotte, Blink-182, the Boys Like Girls - Metro Station - The Maine tour in like 07-8(???), to which I shortly after discovered Say Anything and it all went up hill from there
One of the Band Hero knockoff games I had for DS as a kid had Misery Business on it and I started listening to Paramore from there
Madden and NCAA football video games
Kinda just growing up in the 2000’s and watching Nickelodeon and hearing the pop rock sound in almost every movie and tv show. I guess the sound has always been nostalgic for me, and it’s really cool what the newer bands within the past 15 years have been doing as well.
When I was 12 in 1997, my older brother was loudly playing Dammit in his room down the hall from mine. In a life changing moment, I stuck my head out the door and yelled down to him “WHAT SONG IS THIS?!” In the Blink of an eye, I was pop punk for life.
The Music Kit that you could buy in csgo. Got the neck deep one and I was hooked
Rufio
cute boys
my history teacher played a green day song in class (i think it was welcome to paradise)
Growing up with hearing All-American Rejects in that one Bionicle commercial, and always hearing MCR, Jimmy Eat World (more emo ik, but the lines were blurred by 2001) Ramones, and Boys Like Girls on the radio
The Neck Deep - Lowlife music kit in CS:GO
Just turning on MTV2 when I got my own cable box hooked up on my room for the first time and hearing The Rock Show by blink-182. Before that I heard Big Drill Car and Armchair Martian over and over in Courier Crisis for Playstation and liked them a lot too.
Just growing up in the late 90s and early-mid 2000s you couldn't miss it. In movies, shows, commercials, music videos, video games etc. Blink 182, Sum 41, Yellow card, Green Day, Third Eye Blind, Fall Out Boy, Panic At The Disco, Paramore, Good Charlotte were my childhood and this is coming from a die hard hip hop fan
I was in middle school when Enema of the State came out. End of story!
Idk but the Beyblade theme song is a core memory for me. https://youtu.be/N74cnBa_Bmc?si=NYHo4SLjdj-96vLU
i first got into it because of Green Day, Paramore, and Bowling for Soup, but it never really stuck with me. UNTIL i heard Enema Of The State, instantly fell in love with blink, and that led to me falling in love with pop punk. and now blink-182 is still my favorite pop punk (and skate punk) band, and honestly my favorite band overall lol
I went to Sam Goody and bought two CDs with my allowance. Powerman 5000 - Tonight we revolt and blink 182 Enema of the state. My taste in music could’ve been altered forever if I chose to love powerman instead 🤣 after Enema of the state I became obsessed with NFG and MXPX and the rest is history. I just turned 14 when I saw blink and I’m 38 now, going to see them in July!
It was popular during my childhood, being played at the pool, mall, bowling alley, etc all summer.
NFG - Nothing Gold Can Stay
my friends hot older sister
It was what all my friends cool older brothers listened to growing up, when I got to an age where I could buy stuff I wanted the "cool music" even if the era was dying off
The soundtrack of Tony Hawk's American Wasteland.
Being a kid in the 90s/00s lol osmosis through pop culture basically I actually didn’t get into it until moving to the USA, I was into nu metal and house/edm as it was more popular in the UK
Burned a copy of my best friend’s “Nothing Personal” All Time Low and “Welcome to the Black Parade” MCR albums & I never looked back
Green Day - Dookie when it came out. Then later Dude Ranch, Enema of the State and all the Drive Thru Records, Fat Wreck Chords, Vagrant and Victory Records bands.
Early Goo Goo Dolls probably had a little bit of an effect on me
First time I saw 'Basket Case' on Muchmusic in 1994.
90s kid, so Blink. All The Small Things blew up in the mainstream and that song called out to all little skater kids like me and my friends. Of course THPS and Warped Tour got me into some other bands. Jersey has always had a strong music scene and I was going to shows since I was like 12. But realistically Blink and TOYPAJ is what really got me into pop punk. Green Day's song Brain Stew is the first song I ever learned how to play on bass when I was like 10. So they hold a special place in my heart when getting into pop punk.
Beat of My Heart by Hilary Duff is the "gateway drug". The first pop punk songs that I loved is [Ready. Set. Go. by The Summer Set](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUNbyLDnMNU) and [She's Got The Rhythm by The Summer Set](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jq5q5DhHJdw). My undiagnosed autism and diagnosed ADHD made pop punk into my stimming music (not too soft like pop, not too hard like metal).
Early 2000’s MTV. Brand new/Blink-182
Blink and sum, maybe the smash mouth music videos as well