Take Off Your Pants and Jacket

The album was recorded over three months at Signature Sound in San Diego with producer Jerry Finn. During the sessions, MCA executives pressured the band to retain the sound that helped their previous album sell millions . As such, Take Off Your Pants and Jacket continues the pop-punk tone that Blink-182 had honed and made famous, albeit with a heavier post-hardcore sound inspired by bands such as Fugazi and Refused. Regarding its lyrical content, it has been referred to as a concept album chronicling adolescence, with songs dedicated to first dates, fighting authority, and teenage parties. Due to differing opinions on direction, the trio worked in opposition to one another for the first time, and the sessions sometimes became contentious.


The album had near-immediate success, becoming the first punk rock record to debut at number one on the US Billboard 200 and achieving double platinum certification in May 2002. It produced three hit singles—"The Rock Show", "Stay Together for the Kids", and "First Date"—that were top-ten hits on modern rock charts. Critical impressions of the album were generally positive, commending its expansion on teenage themes, although others viewed this as its weakness. To support the album, the band co-headlined the Pop Disaster Tour with Green Day. Take Off Your Pants and Jacket has sold over 14 million copies worldwide.

Background[edit]

After a long series of performances at clubs and festivals and several indie recordings during the 1990s,^[3] Blink-182 finally achieved mainstream success with the release of Enema of the State in 1999, which launched the band "into the stratosphere of pop music" and catapulted them to become the most popular punk act of the era.^[4][5] The glossy production set Blink-182 apart from the other crossover punk acts of the era, such as Green Day.^[5] Three singles were released from the record—"What's My Age Again?", "All the Small Things", and "Adam's Song"—that crossed over into Top 40 radio format and experienced major commercial success.^[6] The album sold over 15 million copies worldwide and had a considerable impact on pop punk music.^[7][8] The band spent most of 2000 touring in support of Enema of the State, where they headlined arenas for the first time.^[9] The band played to sold-out audiences and performed worldwide during the summer of 2000 on the Mark, Tom and Travis Show Tour.^[10]


The period following Enema of the State saw the band experience great transition. "We had gone from playing small clubs and sleeping on people's floors to headlining amphitheaters and staying in five-star hotels," recalled Hoppus in 2013. "After years of hard work, promotion, and nonstop touring, people knew who we were, and listened to what we were saying ... it scared the shit out of us."^[2][11] The band was rushed into recording the follow-up, as according to DeLonge, "the president of MCA was penalizing us an obscene amount of money because our record wasn't going to be out in time for them to make their quarterly revenue statements. [...] And we were saying, 'Hey, we can't do this right now, we need to reorganize ourselves and really think about what we want to do and write the best record we can.' They didn't agree with us."^[12]

Recording and production[edit]

The band recorded demos at DML Studios, a small practice studio in Escondido, California, where the band had written Dude Ranch and Enema of the State.^[2] The group had written a dozen songs after three weeks and invited their manager, Rick DeVoe, to be the first person outside Blink-182 to hear the new material, which the band found "catchy [but with] a definitive edge".^[1][2][13] DeVoe sat in the control room and quietly listened to the recordings, and pressed the band at the end on why there was no "Blink-182 good-time summer anthem [thing]". DeLonge and Hoppus were furious, remarking, "You want a fucking single? I'll write you the cheesiest, catchiest, throwaway fucking summertime single you've ever heard!"^[2][11] Hoppus went home and wrote lead single "The Rock Show" in ten minutes, and DeLonge similarly wrote "First Date", which became the most successful singles from the record and future live staples.^[13]


The band began proper tracking for drums soon afterwards at Larrabee Studios West and Cello Studios in Hollywood. The working relationship with Jerry Finn had been so fruitful that the same team was largely engaged for Take Off Your Pants and Jacket, with Finn producing and Joe McGrath engineering.^[14] Finn and McGrath, meticulous in acquiring the best sound, took two days to experiment with microphone placement, different compressors, and varying EQs before committing Barker's drums to tape.^[2] The waiting "drove [him] crazy," and Barker recorded his drum parts in "two or three days" while DeLonge and Hoppus watched television upstairs.^[2] Take Off was the first time Barker utilized a click track while recording to ensure timing.^[15] When the drums were finished, the band returned to San Diego to record the bulk of Take Off Your Pants and Jacket at Signature Sound, where they had also recorded its predecessor. While the band worked with few days off, the sessions also proved to be memorable: "We took long dinner breaks, ate Sombrero burritos, watched Family Guy and Mr. Show, and laughed way too hard."^[2] When MCA Records executives eventually traveled to San Diego to hear the highly anticipated follow-up, the trio played a joke by only playing them two joke songs—"Fuck a Dog" and "When You Fucked Hitler" (the subject of which later changed to a grandfather)—and the executives "lost it," in DeLonge's words.^[4][16] MCA put pressure on the band to maintain the sound that made Enema of the State sell millions; as a result, DeLonge believed the album took no "creative leaps [or] bounds."^[4] As such, DeLonge felt creatively stifled and "bummed out" with the label's limitations.^[4][17]


The creative struggle was evident from the outset. Hoppus loved everything regarding Enema of the State—including the music videos and live show—and "wanted to do it again," desiring to create a bigger, better and louder follow-up.^[2] DeLonge, however, was striving for heavier and dirtier guitar-driven rock, which was inspired by post-hardcore bands Fugazi and Refused.^[1] Barker, "never simply a punk rock drummer," wanted to challenge himself and was listening to a great deal of hip hop and heavy metal.^[2][11] The lyrics often turned darker and more introspective for Hoppus, and "love songs became broken love songs."^[2][11] DeLonge rewrote some of his lyrics after listening to songs by Alkaline Trio, feeling as though he needed to "step up his game."^[18] DeLonge pushed his guitar style further away from that on Enema of the State: "Arpeggiated guitar hooks became frenetic 1/16th note spasms," wrote Hoppus in 2013.^[2] Barker's drum parts were looped and filtered, creating different sounds.^[2] For the first time, the trio worked in opposition to one another, and the sessions sometimes became contentious.^[11] Hoppus felt that the sessions created an unspoken competition between him and DeLonge, between who could write the better chorus or most clever lyrics. "Our confidence and insecurity begat some heated differences, sometime to the point where we had to leave rooms and cool down," recalled Hoppus.^[2] Finn would often smooth over differences with a joke, offering a fresh perspective and advice.^[2]


In 2013, Hoppus referred to Take Off Your Pants and Jacket as the "permanent record of a band in transition ... our confused, contentious, brilliant, painful, cathartic leap into the unknown."^[2][11]