Caleb Findley

I enjoyed it. I was in high school from 2003-2006 and very into many of the bands in the book. My major criticism is that it only puts heavy focus on Fall Out Boy, Panic at the Disco, Paramore, and My Chemical Romance, which were the mall emo bands. Jimmy Eat World gets a couple of chapters, which I was glad to see. I know the book is almost 450 pages, but there were so many more bands in the scene that were better than the mainstream emo bands. I do think 2008 was the year the emo bands I grew up enjoying started fading out. Red Jumpsuit Apparatus and Cute Is What We Aim For get ridiculed for not being part of the original scene, and are mention as bands that started a new version of the previous model. Gabe Saporta is in this book a ton, and while I liked Midtown, Cobra Starship is talked about a lot, and that’s not emo. Saporta’s voice his heard in almost every chapter of the book and it gives off the vibe that he was just around and friends with all these mall emo bands, so we need to hear his insight for some reason. Pete Wentz is made to look like a tortured genius, like Kurt Cobain, and I don’t buy it. He’s about as commercial as it gets, and nowhere near a genius. He just wanted to be noticed and did anything he could, no matter how outlandish, to be so. Taking Back Sunday gets some good coverage, but every mention of Brand New is prefaced with how bad Jesse Lacey is, which I don’t believe is necessary. Separate the artist from the art. It was good to see some mentions of Cartel and Permanent Me. I also like that Thursday got a good chunk of the book. They were one of the first bands that got me into emo, and I feel like they’re tragically overlooked if you aren’t from New York or New Jersey. It was also good to see Dashboard Confessional get a couple of chapters, especially the MTV Unplugged show. It was cool to hear the insight of some rivalries (BN and TBS especially), and the formation and destruction of Gerard Way’s and Bert McCracken’s relationship. I think for this book to be perfect, it would have to be 2,000 pages, which isn’t a reality. It was a cool step back in time, and while I wish Senses Fail got some more coverage, Buddy Nielsen gives a lot of commentary. Overall, good book, but a pretty broad look at the emo bands from 1999-2008