When did Emo = Pop Punk?!?!?!?

Due to the nature of this website, I would like to assume that most people here are reallyyyy nostalgic about the 2000s, even if they had just been born. All that pop-punk emo crap that really holds no connection to actual emo, yet I can’t stop listening to it because it feels like home. But, ¿why is it emo if it holds no connection to real emo? Well, it does, you dummy! I’m not a gatekeeping jerk like the ones in r/emos!

We should go back to the early 90s. In the previous entry, I’ve established that bands like Native Nod and Indian Summer pioneered the sound that would stick for the rest of the 90s, and that same sound would later evolve into a form of pop-punk that would inevitably get diluted with actual pop-punk. Because reminder, emo is still punk!

Mid 90s struck, we had Sunny Day Real Estate, The Jazz June, Braid, Mineral, and a lot of similar bands that no one cares about. We’ll split them into two forms because this is important for later entries of the blog. Here I’ll add the current lame timeline I made in Canva so you can visualize what may come next.

View Timeline

As you can see, we have hardcore, post-hardcore, and a fuck ton of stuff no one cares about.

We should focus on the fact that the style of emo that wasn’t just diluted post-hardcore evolved to incorporate elements of either heavier music or mathier music. I’d blame Indian Summer and Cap’n Jazz for that, so yeah, there’s that. But today we will just focus on the mathier and more pop-leaning stuff like SDRE and Christie Park Drive or something I fake ahh emo tbh.

The mentioned emo from the 90s split into two directions, the one that hit mainstream and the one that took us to the weed den. Clearly, the one that took us to the weed den was The Jazz June and Braid with their melodic and soft approaches, unlike Jimmy Eat World who just decided to go full-on pop by their 3rd record if I’m not wrong. It was of course gradual; we didn’t just swap from In Frame and Canvas to Deja Entendu and Grooming Minors in a few months.

It was an overall gradual process that slowly incorporated the math elements, similarly to a caffe latte in which you dilute your coffee to your liking with steamed milk, except that when you reach half a cup of milk, you drink it and instead use the residue to make an Americano cortado that tastes like shit (and love minors if you let it cool for a few years).

Before wrapping up here, I leave a list of 5 bands of both styles:

Mathy Ahh Emo

• The Jazz June
• Braid
• Penfold
• Texas Is The Reason
• The Promise Ring (Midpoint tbh)

However You Call It Ahh Emo

• Sunny Day Real Estate
• The Get Up Kids
• Mineral
• Boys Life
• Jimmy Eat World (?)

Keep in mind, out of all the bands mentioned, for some reason just one actually sounds reminiscent of what would come later, and then in the 2010s they would all start glazing them again for some reason.

I also didn’t mention American Football, but that’s just because I have beef with them for no apparent reason.

Next entry will not follow up this; I want to try to promote my national and dearest Mexican emo scene!!!!!

If y'all want, I’d love to hear your favorite 90s emo bands that do that weird almost grungey sounding pop-punk.