‘I Made a Linguistics Professor Listen to a Blink-182 Song and Analyze the Accent’
22nd March 2016
AND AS I STARED I COUNTEHHHD
THE WEBS FROM ALL THE SPYDURRRS
CATCHEENG THEENGS AND EATING THEIR INSYDES
LIKE INDECISION TO CALL YEUUUWWWW
AND HEAR YOUR VOICE OF TREEEZAWNNN
WILL YEW COME HOME AND STOP THIS PAIN TUHNYTE
STOP THIS PAIN TUHNYTE
I called up a few linguists and music historians to try to get at the heart of the pop-punk voice. But it turns out that when you make a linguist listen to a Blink-182 song, you get more than you expected. Pop-punk vocals are on the forefront of shifting regional dialects and, especially, a major vocal change happening in California in the past few decades. The three-minute pop-punk song, one of the dumbest forms of music ever conceived (in a good way, I’d say), maybe isn’t so dumb, after all.
Sort of like listening to Hillary Clinton giving a speech.