The next link in the chain was an older man named Markus Allan Hoppus. Mark came from a well-off family. And his father worked as a high tech weapons engineer for the U.S. navy. Mark was born in California, but his father's work took the family to various places in the U.S., rarely staying anywhere for more than two years. Mark said the constant moving was the only consistent feature of his childhood. His parents divorced when he was 14, and Mark went to live with his father, Tex, in Washington D.C. When Mark was 16, he returned to California, and settled in the town of Ridgecrest near San Diego. The move back to California wasn't hard since Mark already discovered the joys of the south Californian punk scene. His favorite band was The Descendents, and proved to be a great influence on Blink 182 in later years. Mark's musical development began when he was 14. In return for his help painting a house, Tex's helpers bought Mark a bass guitar and an amp. Before long, Mark began teaching himself to play simple tunes, working out the bass lines of the Descendents songs first. Eventually he would go into more complicated material such as The Cure, or The Replacements. Like Tom, he was also a keen skateboarder. By coincidence, Tom was one of the first people that Mark met on his arrival in the new town. Mark had vague ambitions to become a high school English teacher. So he enrolled at a local college. By chance, Mark's sister was dating Tom's friend. He was informed that Mark was into punk and that he played bass. The first thing Mark did when he went over Tom's house, was climb a light poll outside of Tom's house. He fell and walked with crutches for weeks. A couple of garage rehearsals made them even more ambitious. Before long, Mark and Tom were writing their own simple tunes, and performing for whomever would listen.

It soon became clear that two people weren't enough. Mark and Tom sounded good, but they didn't sound like the punk bands the loved. They would need a drummer before they could really get going. Fortunately, Tom knew a kid at school who played the drums. So they tracked him down and asked him to try out for the band. Scott Raynor was 14 and a big heavy metal fan. For Scott and his friends, Metallica was the best band in the world. Inspired by Lars Ulrich's forceful drumming, Scott bought himself a cheap drum kit and paid for a few lessons. Before long, he developed a respectable ability, and began searching around for fellow musicians. Scott was more into metal than punk, although he did like Green Day. But most of all...he had his own drum kit. So at least Scott was familiar with punk rock. Mark and Tom wanted to get away from the area heavy metal. Scott was willing, so Blink was now a three piece. The three weren't dreaming of fame and riches just yet. For now it was just enough to play in public, the money would come later. But gigs had to be booked. It was soon decided that the band should try to play at local high schools. All the teens loved punk music, so it seemed like ideal venues. There was only one problem. If the band described their material to any head master of principal, there'd be no chance they'd be allowed within a mile of the school. However, Mark suggested that they claimed to be a firmly anti-drug band, and that they just wanted to spread their message to all the kids out there. They'd play in assembly halls, lunch breaks and in gyms. What the teacher thought when they ripped through songs like "Does my Breath Smell?" and "Ben Wah Balls" is unrecorded, but Blink wasn't asked to come back for another performance. Whatever the audience may have thought about them, Blink had achieved their aim. And it wouldn't be the last time they would distort the truth to their own advantage.

Before too much time had passed they became affiliated with local clubs that played for all ages. Their music spread and the ears of the local skate scene seemed to enjoy it especially. As with many bands, their music was heard by a generous band called The Vandals. This led to a deal with Grilled Cheese Music. They were asked to produce a demo tape. The concoctions that resulted were Flyswatter and Buddha. Sensing the next Green Day like band, they were signed. In 1994, Cheshire Cat was released into the world with the name "BLINK" on the front. This produced a new problem. Apparently an Irish techno band named Blink was willing to sue. So they added a random number, 182. Cheshire Cat was reissued with the new 182 and Blink started touring to promote their new album. A base group of true fans was now developing. They toured in a crappy van for months with groups such as NOFX, Pennywise, and even their idols The Descendents. This got the attention of bigger companies. Cargo Music and MCA records contacted them. Blink's next release was Dude Ranch, which has since reached Gold status.

On the tour to promote Dude Ranch, Scott often left to go home. Friend and drummer to the Aquabats, Travis Barker was often asked to fill in for him. He would learn Scott's pieces in less than an hour and usually play them better. So, when Scott left in 1998 to go back to school Travis was the ideal replacement. They were now asked to do a third album. They crapped out Enema of the State in June of 1999, their most successful album to date. The recording of Enema of the State was actually completed in the winter, but they used so much time on mixing and completing the album that they had to set the release date in the summer.

A little more than one year later, on November 7th 2000, blink-182 released a live album called The Mark, Tom, and Travis Show (The Enema Strikes Back). The album was only supposed to be in stores for a few weeks, and the last date to get the record was on January 1st 2001. The show was recorded in the Universal Amphitheatre one year earlier, and contained all their hit singles except Josie and M+M's. The album also had a bonus for the fans with the song Man Overboard, a previously unreleased track that was demo taped in the Enema sessions. Rumors say that the song is about Scott, but only Mark and Tom know the truth. Another bonus on the album was the 29 words of wisdom, recordings of Mark and Toms between-songs talking. One of them (#38) even contain a song about a guy that has sex with his sister.

Between the release of Enema Of The State and The Mark, Tom, And Travis Show, blink won their first MTV award. The moon man was awarded to blink as the best group. Blink were during the days before the show and during the show followed by MTV for the show Diary, and one can wonder if MTV did that as if they had already picked blink as the winner when they decided to put blink on Diary. Blink was featured on many shows on MTV in 2000. There was Diary, there was the making of the video for All The Small Things, making the video for Man Overboard, the relaunch of FANatic, in a new live style, and Road Home. That year (2000) was, in many people's eyes, blink's most successful year so far with that many MTV shows and the release of Adam's Song, Man Overboard and The Mark, Tom, And Travis Show.

Then, three months later, in March 2001, the same month that this site launched, blink went back to the good old Signature Sound Studios in San Diego to record a follow up to the extremely successful Enema of the State. The result was Take Off Your Pants And Jacket, an album not as polished as Enema, but still a poppy album. The album still had blinks old toilet humor in the song Happy Holidays, You Bastard, but was still a more serious album with songs like Stay Together For The Kids and Anthem Part Two.

Blink then went on a tour to support their new album. This tour had some neat pyrotechnics, and was Blink's biggest tour ever. Warm up bands were names like New Found Glory, Sum 41, Bad Religion, Alkaline Trio and more. The tour earned a total of $13 million over 64 shows, giving it the 31st position in North American tour earnings of 2001. This was three positions above the Warped Tour. Their European tour of 2001 was postponed because of the attacks on World Trade Center on September 11th! The new dates were supposed to be played in January 2002, but Tom then got a back injury that he had to heal. During that off-time, Tom and Travis went in studio again, but not to record an album for blink. The material they recorded was for a side project called Box Car Racer, an opportunity for Tom to write some darker stuff and for Travis to play more (experimental stuff). The self titled album was released on May 21st.

After resting a few months Tom and the rest of blink-182 went on tour with Green Day, Jimmy Eat World and Saves The Day in April 2002. The tour was big, and the tour was a Pop Disaster. During the Pop Disaster tour, Tom's wife gave birth to a baby girl. She was named Ava Elizabeth Delonge, and just a few weeks later, Mark's wife Skye had a baby boy called Jack.

Then First Date was nominated as best rock video on vma2002, but lost to No Doubt's Hey Baby! Then during some more off time, Travis found time to release a cd with Rob Ashton and Tim Armstrong for a project called Transplants. That was even more experimental than Box Car Racer, and the cd was released in October 2002.

Box Car Racer also found time to go on tour in October, and that meant that Mark had a few months off to enjoy fatherhood. In fact, blink didn't play one single show between September 2002 - July 2003, it was the first time in years that blink didn't play one single New Years or Christmas show.