During a recent chat with Zane Lowe, blink-182 filled us in on all that led up to their surprising reunion, which no one found more shocking than lead singer Mark Hoppus himself.
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Feeling lucky to back on stage at all after being diagnosed with diffuse large B-cell lymphoma back in 2021, it was actually for that other reason Hoppus was certain he’d never share the stage with his both blink-182 bandmates again. You know… the band’s highly-publicized fallout — that is, until, Hoppus’ diagnosis shifted everything.
While he and drummer Travis Barker always stayed in touch during the bands time apart, his relationship with Tom DeLonge was quite the opposite. However when cancer entered the picture, everything changed, with their friendship, but also in many other ways.
By September of the same year, Hoppus was cancer-free, but it took a while to get back to normal: “I was still f***ing hollow, just a shell,” he shared. “[I had a] s***ty, weak brain eaten with the chemotherapy and pain and everything else. And then getting back in the studio to make this record was like learning how to play bass again.”
Mark revealed to Zane how chemotherapy forced him to “relearn” how to be a musician again. “The chemotherapy wrecked my vocal cords. I had to go to work with a vocal coach. I had to rebuild my throat. I had all this stuff had to rebuild to get to the point where we could go and walk on stage at Coachella and have one of the biggest shows of our career and have this album, which — touch wood — is one of the best albums we’ve ever written.”
DeLonge added in how blink-182 had Hoppus’ back, drawing parallels from the diagnosis to the fatal plane crash that nearly killed Barker back in 2008. “I remember sitting with Mark at his house and it was just very much like, ‘you’re sick,'” DeLonge said. “‘We’re going to get you through this and we’re going to make the best music we ever made. Let’s do it. Let’s have a North Star.’ I wanted him to have a North Star.”
And that’s exactly what they did, “It feels like the best time in the band in forever,” Mark gushed.
Check out the interview below.