When I was a teenager I listened to emo music. This was in the middle age of emo. In the beginning emo was an outgrowth of hardcore rock which was explified by more emotional lyrics. Then somehow the soft acoustic music of Dashboard Confessional in addition to the pop-inspired rock of Jimmy Eat World became associated with emo. The story goes that early in their career Jimmy Eat World was an emo band and when their first commercial success, Bleed American, came around everybody called them emo despite the change in their musical style. Similarly, Dashboard Confessional was the side project of the lead singer of a band called Further Seems Forever who were a heavy punk rock band with emo sensibilities and so it seems likely the label simply traversed the chasm between the parent band and the side project. The middle age of emo was a mixed bag. A lot of it was simply duplicating the pop-punk Jimmy Eat World style rather than duplicating the lyrical style. But there were a precious few who wrote heartfelt songs about love and heartbreak. I should state here that when emo began it was not exclusively romantic in nature; the lyrics had to resonate emotionally with the listener but it could be about anything which came from the heart. The middle age of emo changed that of course.

In my eyes, the middle age of emo is not exemplified by bands or even albums but individual songs. Dashboard Confessional’s earlier works (essentially everything earlier than “A Mission, A Mark, A Brand, A Scar”) are the closest you can get to the prototypal emo band, but even then certain songs are more immanently emo.

Of course you can see where the path of emo went. It followed the path of the superficial pop-punk. And so now we have bands like Fall Out Boy who are considered emo. And thus the pejorative use of the word began. I don’t want to get into a huge rant about how the changing definition of emo has marred the works of the middle age emo bands I just want you to know that emo isn’t all bad. In fact, there are songs from the middle age of emo that I still listen to on a regular basis.

The real problem here is that emo has forgotten its origins. Emo was an offshoot of punk at first and punk’s primary philosophy is “Fuck You.” So in my eyes, which are tainted by my understanding of emo, emo is about guys saying yeah I’m a romantic and I’m not all about female conquest. I have meaningful discourse and don’t limit myself to what’s appropriate. I don’t care if you think I’m a pussy because I like cuddling. I don’t care that you’re a misogynistic douche and can’t understand guys who want co-operative and equal partnerships with their lovers. Fuck You.

And I’d like to think that if Coleridge and Wordsworth were around today, they’d be in emo bands. The good kind though.