100 Fun Facts About Emo

Emo emerged in the mid-1980s from the hardcore punk scene of which US city?

Washington, D.C. Its hardcore shows had turned violent by 1984, and the bands of 1985's 'Revolution Summer' answered with more personal songs, soon tagged 'emocore', a label the bands themselves hated.

Which Minor Threat frontman formed Embrace and ran Dischord Records?

Ian MacKaye. He co-founded the label in 1980 to put out his own band's record, and when a magazine filed Embrace under 'emocore' he told a crowd it was the stupidest thing he had ever heard.

Rites of Spring's Guy Picciotto and Brendan Canty went on to join which post-hardcore band?

Fugazi. Picciotto never accepted the tag pinned on his earlier band: 'I've never recognized emo as a genre of music,' he later said, asking whether other punk bands were robots.

Which 1994 Sub Pop album by Sunny Day Real Estate is widely seen as a defining record of second-wave emo?

Diary. Rolling Stone ranked it first among emo albums in 2016; at the time the band gave a single interview, allowed one publicity photo and refused to play California.

After Sunny Day Real Estate split in 1995, Nate Mendel and William Goldsmith became the rhythm section of which new band?

Foo Fighters. Dave Grohl left the pair a note at one of their last shows; Mendel stayed on, but Goldsmith quit in 1997 after Grohl secretly re-recorded his drum parts.

Which 1996 Weezer album was retroactively embraced as a cornerstone of 1990s emo?

Pinkerton. Rolling Stone readers voted it the third-worst album of 1996 and Rivers Cuomo called it 'a hideous record', until emo's next wave of stars named it as an influence.

Fans make pilgrimages to an Urbana, Illinois house because it is on the cover of which band's 1999 debut?

American Football. The members never lived in the house, but in 2023 they joined their label and others to buy it, making the band part-owners of its own album cover.

Which label has released The Emo Diaries compilation series since 1997?

Deep Elm Records. The label says it chose every band from blind submissions, more than 10,000 in all, so mostly unsigned acts filled the volumes.

Jimmy Eat World formed in 1993 in which Arizona city?

Mesa. The name came from a child's drawing of guitarist Tom Linton's younger brother Jimmy stuffing the globe into his mouth, captioned 'Jimmy eat world'.

Dropped by Capitol, Jimmy Eat World paid for which 2001 album themselves and watched it go platinum?

Bleed American. The band worked odd jobs and toured to pay for the sessions, and signed with DreamWorks only once the record was done.

Which 1999 Jimmy Eat World album, a commercial flop at the time, became a touchstone for later emo bands?

Clarity. Capitol dropped the band when it failed to sell, but the album and its sixteen-minute closer, 'Goodbye Sky Harbor', went on to become a cult classic.

Which singer, called 'the face of emo' by critic Jim DeRogatis, fronts Dashboard Confessional?

Chris Carrabba. He started Dashboard as a solo side project while singing for Further Seems Forever and teaching at an elementary school in South Florida.

Dashboard Confessional's 'Vindicated' played over the closing credits of which 2004 blockbuster?

Spider-Man 2. Another of the band's songs was due on the soundtrack until its frontman saw a screening of the film and, by his own account, wrote 'Vindicated' in ten minutes.

Which record label's 2001 national tour, sponsored by Microsoft and Coca-Cola, signalled emo going corporate?

Vagrant Records. Two years earlier its founders had borrowed $50,000 from one partner's parents, who mortgaged their house, to pay for a single band's album.

Which New Jersey band signed a multimillion-dollar Island Def Jam deal after 2001's Full Collapse?

Thursday. Its singer, Geoff Rickly, produced My Chemical Romance's debut album the following year, giving another New Jersey band its start.

Taking Back Sunday's 2002 debut album on Victory Records was called what?

Tell All Your Friends. By then original bassist Jesse Lacey had quit after a falling-out with guitarist John Nolan and formed Brand New, and the two bands feuded for years.

Which Dayton band broke through in 2004 with the single 'Ohio Is for Lovers'?

Hawthorne Heights. MTV airplay for the song turned their slow-selling debut into a breakout, their next album reached number three in the US, and a long legal fight with their label followed.

My Chemical Romance formed in New Jersey after Gerard Way witnessed what?

The September 11 attacks. Seeing the towers fall made Way rethink his life and start a band, and he poured that day into its first song, 'Skylines and Turnstiles'.

My Chemical Romance's name comes from a book by which author?

Irvine Welsh. Bassist Mikey Way was working in a Barnes & Noble when the title Ecstasy: Three Tales of Chemical Romance caught his eye, and he suggested it to his brother.

The Black Parade is a concept album about a character known as what?

The Patient. He is dying of cancer, and death comes for him in the shape of his fondest memory: the day his father took him to see a marching band.

Which Hollywood legend sings guest vocals on the track 'Mama' on The Black Parade?

Liza Minnelli. The goth-cabaret song began as a dare: guitarist Ray Toro was bet that he couldn't write a polka in the band's style.

Which Disney soundtrack kept The Black Parade from number one in 2006?

Hannah Montana. The Black Parade sold 240,000 US copies that week, by far the band's biggest, and still lost to the Disney Channel soundtrack's 281,000.

On which holiday in 2019 did My Chemical Romance announce their reunion?

Halloween. Tickets for the single Los Angeles comeback show sold out within minutes, and the pandemic then pushed the full reunion tour back to 2022.

Fall Out Boy took their name from a character in which TV show?

The Simpsons. Fallout Boy is the young sidekick of the show's comic-book hero Radioactive Man; the name went on the band's shortlist and their friends voted for it.

Which Fall Out Boy album debuted at number one in 2007, selling 260,000 copies in its first week?

Infinity on High. Jay-Z guests on the record, and its title comes from a letter Vincent van Gogh wrote to his brother Theo in 1888 about his returning health.

Which Fall Out Boy member founded the Decaydance label that signed Panic! at the Disco?

Pete Wentz. Panic! were the first act on his new imprint, signed when they had two songs online and had yet to play a single live show.

Which Panic! at the Disco video won Video of the Year at the 2006 MTV VMAs?

I Write Sins Not Tragedies. Its circus-crashed wedding took the night's top prize while losing every other category it was up for, the first winner since 1989 to do that.

Which city did Panic! at the Disco come from?

Las Vegas. The four were school friends there; after the others left one by one, Brendon Urie carried the name on alone from 2015 and retired it in 2023.

Which Panic! at the Disco single reached number 4 on the Hot 100 in 2018, their best chart placing?

High Hopes. The biggest hit came when the 'band' was down to Brendon Urie alone, and it went on to spend a record 65 weeks in all atop Billboard's Hot Rock Songs chart.

Paramore's 'Decode' was written for the soundtrack of which 2008 film?

Twilight. The song had its premiere on the website of the novels' author, Stephenie Meyer, seven weeks before the film reached cinemas.

In 2024 Paramore became the first female-fronted band to win which Grammy for This Is Why?

Best Rock Album. Solo women had taken it before, Alanis Morissette and Sheryl Crow among them, but in almost thirty years of the award no band fronted by a woman had won.

Which single from Paramore's 2007 album Riot! carried the band into the mainstream?

Misery Business. In 2018 Hayley Williams announced the band would stop playing it because of a lyric she had come to regret, and it stayed out of the set until 2022.

Fueled by Ramen, home to Fall Out Boy, Paramore and Panic!, was founded in 1996 in which city?

Gainesville, Florida. John Janick had the idea in high school and started the label once he was a University of Florida student, with Vinnie Fiorello, drummer of local band Less Than Jake.

Which accessory completed the mid-2000s emo look of skinny jeans, black eyeliner and long side-swept bangs?

A studded belt. A tight T-shirt with a band's name finished the outfit, even though many of the bands on those shirts refused to be called emo at all.

Which emo offshoot was pioneered in early-1990s San Diego by bands such as Heroin and Antioch Arrow?

Screamo. The style grew out of that small scene's harsh, experimental hardcore, and a decade later a pop version of it reached the charts through bands like Silverstein and Story of the Year.

Which 2021 Olivia Rodrigo hit gave Paramore's Hayley Williams a co-writing credit after listeners heard echoes of an old Paramore single?

Good 4 U. Williams and former guitarist Josh Farro were added to the credits three months after its release, a nod to how much the song owed to one of their band's biggest hits.

Emo rap emerged in the 2010s largely through which platform?

SoundCloud. The scene that grew on the site in the 2010s set rap verses to samples of pop-punk and emo songs, drawing on bands such as Mineral and Underoath.

Which emo rapper died of a fentanyl overdose in November 2017 at the age of 21?

Lil Peep. He died in Tucson, the city where he had played his first live show less than two years before, two weeks after his 21st birthday.

Which emo festival relaunched in 2022 with My Chemical Romance and Paramore as its headliners?

When We Were Young. The name first appeared in 2017 on a California weekend headlined by Morrissey; the 2022 relaunch sold out so quickly that second and third dates were added.

Which Kansas City band followed a debut recorded in one weekend with 1999's acclaimed Something to Write Home About?

The Get Up Kids. They had cut their first album, Four Minute Mile, in a single weekend so that drummer Ryan Pope, who was still in high school, wouldn't miss class.

Which social network, launched in 2003, became the online home of the mid-2000s emo subculture?

Myspace. It was the world's largest social network from 2005 to 2009, just as the subculture went mainstream, and some of the scene's best-known faces were famous simply for their profiles.

Which punk trio led by Blake Schwarzenbach released 24 Hour Revenge Therapy in 1994, then signed a $1 million major-label deal?

Jawbreaker. The three had met as New York University students; fans turned on Dear You, the polished major-label album that followed, and the band split within a year.

Which brothers formed Cap'n Jazz in Buffalo Grove, Illinois, under the name Toe Jam?

Tim and Mike Kinsella. Tim sang and Mike drummed, and when the band split in 1995 its members scattered into Joan of Arc, the Promise Ring and Owls.

In 2002 Dashboard Confessional became the first act without a platinum record to tape which MTV series?

MTV Unplugged. The gamble paid off: the CD-and-DVD set of the session topped Billboard's Independent Albums chart and was certified platinum within six months.

Which Jimmy Eat World single topped Billboard's Modern Rock chart and reached number five on the Hot 100 in 2002?

The Middle. Jim Adkins wrote its pep talk after an email from a young fan who felt she wasn't 'punk enough' to fit in with the kids at her school.

Which travelling punk-rock festival crossed North America every summer from 1995 to 2019 and returned in 2025?

Warped Tour. It began as a skate-punk and ska roadshow, and founder Kevin Lyman later recalled a 'real backlash' among its bands when emo groups joined the bill.

Which 2005 Fall Out Boy album produced 'Sugar, We're Goin Down' and 'Dance, Dance'?

From Under the Cork Tree. The title is a line from The Story of Ferdinand, the 1936 children's book about a bull who would sooner sit and smell the flowers than fight.

Which Utah band fronted by Bert McCracken rose to fame with a debut album in 2002?

The Used. In their early days the members panhandled for change and couch-surfed, and they recorded their demos using the drummer's closet as a vocal booth.

The 2025 fossil Emo vorticaudum, named after the music genre, was what kind of creature?

A mollusk. Its describers said the worm-like animal's bristly coat recalled the long fringes of emo fans, and they named a spikier fossil from the same English site Punk.

In March 2008 a wave of street attacks on emo teenagers broke out in which country?

Mexico. Hundreds of youths who had organised online set upon emo teenagers in a plaza in Querétaro, and further attacks followed in the heart of Mexico City.

Fall Out Boy flew to Chile in 2008 hoping to reach Antarctica and claim which Guinness World Record?

Playing all seven continents inside nine months was the plan, including a set for scientists in Antarctica. Bad weather grounded the flight out of Punta Arenas and the bid died.

Which animated series pitted its goth kids against a plague of emos in the episode Goth Kids 3: Dawn of the Posers?

South Park sent goth girl Henrietta to a camp for troubled teens, and she came home an emo. The plot spoofs Invasion of the Body Snatchers, with goths converted one by one.

Which pop star featured Fall Out Boy and Paramore's Hayley Williams on bonus tracks of a 2023 re-recorded album?

Taylor Swift put both on Speak Now (Taylor's Version): Fall Out Boy on Electric Touch and Williams on Castles Crumbling. She duets with singer Patrick Stump on the first.

Which comic written by My Chemical Romance singer Gerard Way was adapted into a hit Netflix series?

The Umbrella Academy began in 2007 as a comic Way wrote while still fronting the band. Its Netflix adaptation ran for four seasons.

Gabe Saporta's band Cobra Starship made its name with a theme song for which Samuel L. Jackson thriller?

Snakes on a Plane got its theme, Bring It, from Saporta and members of Gym Class Heroes and The Sounds. The video ran over the film's closing credits.

Fall Out Boy scored a 2008 hit by covering which Michael Jackson song, with John Mayer playing the guitar solo?

Beat It carried an Eddie Van Halen solo on Jackson's original, the part John Mayer took on here. The cover was the band's last US top-twenty single until 2013.

Which mall chain, opened in California in 1989, became the go-to shop for emo band T-shirts and skinny jeans?

Hot Topic earned roughly 40% of its 2007 revenue from licensed band T-shirts alone. Founder Orv Madden opened the first store in Montclair, California.

Fall Out Boy and Panic! at the Disco covered songs for a 2006 soundtrack reissue of which Tim Burton film?

The Nightmare Before Christmas returned to cinemas in 3-D that year with a bonus disc of covers. Marilyn Manson, Fiona Apple and She Wants Revenge filled out the disc.

Panic! at the Disco recorded the end-credits version of Into the Unknown for which Disney animated sequel?

Frozen II has Idina Menzel and Aurora sing the song in the film itself, with the band's own version saved for the end credits.

Jimmy Eat World took their name from what, made by a guitarist's little brother as revenge on a sibling?

A crayon drawing by Ed Linton showed his brother Jim, who usually won their fights, shoving the whole Earth into his mouth. Ed's caption became the band name.

Fall Out Boy formed in 2001 in Wilmette, a suburb of which Midwestern city?

Chicago's suburb of Wilmette had the Borders bookstore where Patrick Stump butted into a chat about the band Neurosis and met guitarist Joe Trohman. Talk soon turned to a new project.

Paramore formed in 2004 in Franklin, a town in which Southern US state?

Tennessee became home when 13-year-old Hayley Williams moved to Franklin from Meridian, Mississippi. She met brothers Josh and Zac Farro at a weekly program for home-schooled students.

Which Florida band behind 2003's Ocean Avenue stood out in pop-punk by featuring a full-time violinist?

Yellowcard violinist Sean Mackin grew up on classical music and names Itzhak Perlman as a favourite. The single Ocean Avenue went double platinum in the US.

Which Oklahoma band led by Tyson Ritter scored hits with Dirty Little Secret and Gives You Hell?

The All-American Rejects formed in Stillwater while Ritter and guitarist Nick Wheeler were still in high school. Gives You Hell climbed to number four on the Hot 100.

Which rapper's 2010 hit Airplanes featured a chorus sung by Paramore's Hayley Williams?

B.o.B wrote only his verses: the chorus Williams sings came from the songwriting duo Kinetics & One Love and Christine Dominguez.

Panic! at the Disco frontman Brendon Urie starred on Broadway in 2017 in which musical?

Kinky Boots cast Urie as Charlie Price, who inherits a shoe factory and rescues it by making high-heeled boots with a drag queen named Lola.

Taking Back Sunday, Brand New and Glassjaw all came out of the music scene in which part of New York?

Long Island neighbours Brand New and Taking Back Sunday carried on a very public feud in their early years. Brand New's Jesse Lacey had been Taking Back Sunday's founding bassist.

Andrew McMahon fronted both Something Corporate and Jack's Mannequin while playing which instrument?

Piano took over McMahon's life at nine, when an uncle's death moved him to start teaching himself. His 2021 memoir is titled Three Pianos.

Besides Vans, which sneaker brand does the classic mid-2000s emo wardrobe usually include?

Converse sneakers, Vans and black wristbands rounded out the mid-2000s look. Converse had already been part of the tidier, cardigan-wearing emo style of the 1990s.

Rob Cavallo, producer of My Chemical Romance's The Black Parade, made his name signing and producing which punk band?

Green Day's Dookie and American Idiot were both Cavallo productions, and Boulevard of Broken Dreams won him a Record of the Year Grammy.

My Chemical Romance's Helena was written by Gerard and Mikey Way in memory of which relative?

Their grandmother Elena died while the band was on tour, and Gerard Way poured his guilt at missing her final year into the song.

My Chemical Romance covered Bob Dylan's Desolation Row for the soundtrack of which comic-book film?

Watchmen director Zack Snyder shot the cover's music video himself, cutting between the band on a theatre stage and a rioting crowd.

The video for Fall Out Boy's Sugar, We're Goin Down follows a boy with which unusual feature?

Deer antlers make the boy an outcast, and his girlfriend's father orders him to stay away. He tries to cut them off before she stops him.

Fall Out Boy singer Patrick Stump originally planned to try out for the band on which instrument?

Drums were Stump's instrument in a grindcore band, but Joe Trohman urged him to bring an acoustic guitar to the tryout instead. His singing impressed, and the band had its frontman.

Which Ontario post-hardcore band named itself after the author of Where the Sidewalk Ends?

Silverstein borrowed the surname of children's poet Shel Silverstein, whose books the members had read and admired as kids.

My Chemical Romance fans rallied in London in 2008 to protest which newspaper's coverage of emo?

Daily Mail articles had branded emo a cult linked to self-harm. Police concerns scaled back a planned march on the paper's offices, so fans rallied at Marble Arch instead.

Lawmakers in which country proposed banning emo dress in schools and government buildings?

Russia's Duma heard the proposal, which also covered emo websites, after the subculture was labelled a dangerous teen trend that encouraged social withdrawal.

Fall Out Boy, Panic! at the Disco and Paramore each headlined an annual tour named after which car?

Honda Civic Tour headline slots went to Fall Out Boy in 2007, Panic! at the Disco in 2008 and Paramore in 2010. Blink-182 had topped the bill back in 2001.

Rites of Spring, pioneers of 1980s emo, took their name from a ballet by which composer?

Igor Stravinsky's ballet The Rite of Spring drew the band in after they read about the brawling audience at its first performance.

Fall Out Boy stripped the vowels from Thnks fr th Mmrs after their label asked them to do what?

Shorten their song titles, said Island Records, tired of the band's famously wordy names. The band obliged by deleting vowels instead of words.

Paramore's name began as the maiden name of which person linked to an early Paramore line-up?

A bassist's mother supplied the surname. The band adopted it after learning it sounds like paramour, an old word for a secret lover, and kept their own spelling.

Matt Skiba, who replaced Tom DeLonge in Blink-182 in 2015, was already known for fronting which punk band?

Alkaline Trio began in 1996 when Skiba quit design school to start the band. He then spent 2015 to 2022 as Blink-182's co-lead singer and guitarist.

Which California band fronted by Davey Havok topped the US album chart in 2006 with Decemberunderground?

AFI, short for A Fire Inside, formed in Ukiah in 1991 and spent years as a hardcore punk act. The album's single Miss Murder later turned up in Guitar Hero III.

Post-hardcore band Funeral for a Friend formed in 2001 in Bridgend, a town in which country?

Wales is where the band took shape, in the town of Bridgend, out of an earlier group called January Thirst. Their name comes from a song by Planes Mistaken for Stars.

Charlie Simpson quit which chart-topping British pop band in 2005 to focus on post-hardcore group Fightstar?

Busted had given Simpson four UK number-one singles, but he had grown frustrated that the band left no room for his own heavier ideas.

Conor Oberst's Bright Eyes and the Saddle Creek label grew out of the indie scene in which Midwestern city?

Omaha was home to Saddle Creek Records, co-founded by Oberst's brother Justin. One early Bright Eyes album was taped mostly in the family basement.

Panic! at the Disco landed a record deal after sending a demo to a Fall Out Boy member through which website?

LiveJournal carried the demo that Ryan Ross and Brendon Urie sent, and it won the band a recording contract before they had performed a single live show.

Which music magazine, first handed out at Cleveland concerts in 1985, put My Chemical Romance on its 300th cover?

Alternative Press was started by Mike Shea to champion bands playing underground music, with the first issue given away at shows in June 1985.

Which regional name is given to the 1990s emo style known for arpeggiated guitar melodies and math-rock influences?

Midwest emo bands turned away from the genre's hardcore punk roots towards indie rock. Their sound later inspired a revival that began in the late 2000s.

Panic! at the Disco dropped the exclamation mark from their name during the era of which album?

Pretty. Odd. arrived in 2008 with a new logo and a name minus its exclamation point. The punctuation was back by July 2009.

Which California label run by siblings Richard and Stefanie Reines was home to New Found Glory and Something Corporate?

Drive-Thru Records got its bands into stores through a distribution deal with MCA, which in return could sign away any act on the roster.

Which My Chemical Romance member also fronted the hardcore punk quintet Leathermouth?

Frank Iero led Leathermouth through their 2009 debut album XO, then released a first solo album, Stomachaches, in 2014.

Andy Greenwald's 2003 book on emo borrowed its title, Nothing Feels Good, from an album by which Milwaukee band?

The Promise Ring formed in 1995 and soon made Cap'n Jazz guitarist Davey von Bohlen their singer. The 1997 album made them the best-selling emo band of their day.

Which Florida band's original singer quit after one album to concentrate on Dashboard Confessional?

Further Seems Forever recorded The Moon Is Down with their first frontman before he left. He was back on vocals when the band reunited in 2010.

Which New Jersey band led by Chris Conley followed 1999's Through Being Cool with Stay What You Are?

Saves the Day formed in Princeton in 1997 with Conley as singer. The band went on to play Conan O'Brien's late-night show and land videos in rotation on MTV2.

Which Minneapolis band made the Moog synthesizer a signature of the pop-punk sound on Commit This to Memory?

Motion City Soundtrack took up the Moog after guitarist Joshua Cain heard it on a 1995 album by The Rentals. Keyboardist Jesse Johnson made the moogstand his signature move.

Which name did Dischord Records staffer Amy Pickering give the 1985 push to steer hardcore punk away from violence?

Revolution Summer bands Rites of Spring, Embrace and Gray Matter are counted among the first emo acts. The movement itself lasted only a few months.

Which Delaware label, founded in 1990 by Darren Walters and Tim Owen, released Lifetime's album Hello Bastards?

Jade Tree had its founders' interest rekindled by an unreleased Lifetime demo, and the band signed in 1995. The label then grew into a home for emo and melodic hardcore.

Which Texas band's 1997 debut The Power of Failing is hailed as a classic of 1990s emo?

Mineral formed in Houston and got an early break when Denver's Christie Front Drive released the band's first single, Gloria.

Which Christian rock label, founded by Brandon Ebel in 1993, took Underoath's Define the Great Line to number two?

Tooth & Nail started out in California in November 1993 and later moved north. That 2006 debut on the Billboard 200 ranks among the label's greatest successes.