Blink 182 to auction lyrics in support of Japan

For the good cause: Blink-182

Pop punk maestros Blink 182 have added their names to the list of bands making a contribution to the nuclear crisis in Japan. Mark Hoppus is donating a number of items to an online auction. Goodies available include a T-shirt used in a video for “Dammit”, used backstage passes and the door sign from their MTV VMA award appearance.

Pride of place must go to the handwritten lyrics to their first major hit, “Dammit”. The four sheets were valued at over $20,300.

American pop-punk

Blink-182 is considered a key group in the development of American pop punk in the nineties. Their combination of pop melodies with fast-paced punk rock featured was more radio-friendly than other bands in the genre. The trio has sold over thirteen million albums in the United States alone, and over 50 million worldwide. In 2011, The New York Times asserted, “no punk band of the 1990s has been more influential than Blink-182,” and even as the band receded after its 2005 split, “its sound and style could be heard in the muscular pop punk of Fall Out Boy or in the current wave of high-gloss Warped Tour punk bands, like All Time Low and The Maine.”

Despite several very public break-ups, the group re-united after a dramatic air crash and continue to record.