Silly, fun but not art, gross-out band Blink 182 releases new CD

There are a few things that are constant in this world. Gravity will keep making things fall down. Stephen King will continue crapping out popular horror fiction. Unattractive college students who can't get any will continue to be sexiled by their much better looking roommates. Van Halen will continue hiring and firing frontmen. And Blink 182 will continue making dick/boob/fart jokes and writing songs about failed teenage love.

Unfortunately, then, it seems as though the world as we know it has come to an end. Yes, the unthinkable and unimaginable has occurred: on their new self-titled release, Mark, Tom and Travis have made the conscious decision to try to grow up. The operative word, it bears to mention, is "try." Whether they have succeeded and, perhaps more importantly, whether it was the correct decision to make, is the issue.

After all, what is there to Blink 182 besides their immaturity and wacky antics? Musically, the band is mediocre at best. Drummer Travis Barker may be one of the best alive, but he has never really been able to pull the dead weight created by bassist Mark Hoppus and guitarist Tom DeLonge. While both are respectable hook musicians (and, to be fair, DeLonge is somewhat underrated), capable of churning out catchy, though straightforward and crude, lines, neither can boast any impressive musical ability.

Truly, the only merit of the band's first three releases (Buddha, Cheshire Cat and the breakout Dude Ranch), on none of which Barker performs, lies in the band's overly simplistic pop hooks and silliness. Hoppus and DeLonge's lyrics have never contained even a single shred of what could pass for art, as evidenced by the band's most successful song, the completely nonsencial "All the Small Things."

Admirably, the band has attempted to address each of these issues with its new album, and in many ways they've succeeded. The problem, though, is that everything that made Blink 182 suck also made them somewhat good. What other mainstream pop band out there writes uber-catchy songs about having sex with one's pets, parents and siblings? Blink may not have been an artsy band, but they were at the very least a fun one.

The most obvious change on Blink 182 is more elaborate songwriting. Seemingly taking a cue from Barker's work with his side project, The Transplants, Hoppus and DeLonge have put him to work delivering much more irregular and intricate beats.

.....While the guitar work may not be much more complex than on the band's last two releases, "Enema of the State" and "Take Off Your Pants and Jacket," chord progressions and arrangements as a whole are not as clichéd or predictable.

While beneath the surface this is the band's most polished album yet (it took well over a year to record), at first glance it appears to be its roughest. There are hints of the band's former sugary sweet poppiness, but as a whole the album is utterly un-Blink. They've tried to fuse elements of electronica, hard rock, 80s Brit pop, reggae and Latin music into their trademark "mall punk" style.

But it seems as though the band tried so hard not to replicate their previous efforts that they have been confined by them. This is Blink 182 trying not to be Blink 182.

The album's first single, "Action," features perhaps its purest traditional Blink hook, as Hoppus sings "Fate fell short this time/ Your smile fades in the Summer/ Place your hand in mine/ I'll leave when I wanna." And yes, in addition to "Action" there are a few songs, such as "Go" and "Here's Your Letter," that are relatively fast-paced and, while certainly more mature and serious than "What's My Age Again?" or "The Rock Show," still reminiscent of that "Blink 182 style."

Unfortunately, the album primarily consists of slower and more boring songs, like "I Miss You," "Down," "Always," and "I'm Lost Without You." A few of these are eerily similar to some of the cuts off of DeLonge's underwhelming side project, Boxcar Racer.

Blink 182 is a band built for speed, not drawn-out sentimental songs. "Slow" does not necessarily entail "mature," as evidenced by such seminal punk bands as Bad Religion and Social Distortion. Moreover, keeping the songs fast provides better cover for the fact that Hoppus and Delonge suck at guitar.

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It's difficult to pull off an album of mature songs when you just don't have it in you to write an album's worth of mature lyrics. The band's potty-mouthed brand of words was somewhat unique, but those written for this album and their delivery seem particularly generic and derivative.

"Violence," astonishingly, features spoken word verses and is crowned by a chorus in which DeLonge sings, "Like violence you have me/ Forever and after." Obviously, DeLonge's stab at writing emo lyrics such as these fails miserably. They will, however, undoubtedly inspire countless AOL Instant Messenger profile and away message quotes by young pop punk kids who pretend to have a clue as to what the guy is talking about. Like so many emo songwriters, DeLonge apparently hopes that his lyrical nonsense will be interpreted as poetry.

"Stockholm Syndrome" is preceded by nearly two minutes of a woman reading a love letter in an English accent accompanied only by a piano. Unfortunately, her speech is so juvenile that it's laughable, making for an awkward feeling when you realize she's reciting passages from letters written by Hoppus' grandfather to his grandmother during World War II. The random placement of electronic beats throughout the album seems to serve no purpose besides being a blatant Refused ripoff.

Still, there are redeeming qualities to Blink 182. These primarily consist of the seven minutes taken up by "Easy Target" and "All of This." The former is perhaps the best song the band has ever written, and provides evidence that locked away deep within Hoppus and DeLonge may very well lie some true punk/alt-rock talent.

Although Hoppus' voice is normally somewhat emotionless and lifeless, when he sings, "Holly's looking dry/ Looking for an easy target/ Let her slit my throat/ Give her ammo if she'll use it/ Caution on the road lies lies and hidden danger/ Southern California's breeding Mommy's little monster," he seems imbued with his fair share of passion and anger, even if he is trying to imitate bands like Taking Back Sunday that regularly use such forceful and morbid imagery.

"Easy Target," while clearly a strong enough song to stand on its own, bleeds into "All of This," which features vocals by the brilliant and legendary Robert Smith (The Cure). While it may be slowest song on the album, Smiths' presence just makes it work. Had either Hoppus or DeLonge sung lead on it, it would not have been nearly as successful. DeLonge's call of "Use me, Holly/ C'mon and use me" and Smith's answer of "We know where we're going" are wrought with power.

Still, one day down the line Blink 182 will probably look back at this album as their "mistake album." They will undoubtedly lose fans as a result of it, and while their effort to break away from the expectations of the music industry and their fanbase is respectable, it's ultimately, as a whole, a failed one. Hoppus, DeLonge, and Barker are all now married and approaching or over 30; an attempt at mature songwriting was inevitable. However, they seem to have disregarded everything that had previously made them an enjoyable band, instead of combining it with the new direction in which they wished to go. Oh well, maybe they'll get it right next time.