What was your initial reaction when the untitled album came out?

TL;DR - I was 12 when I first heard Blink 182, and I was obsessed from the first time I hear All the Small Things. I love it now, but when the untitled album came out, I absolutely hated it. I felt genuinely depressed.

I remember buying Now That's What I Call Music 3 and listening to What's My Age Again on a loop. I had to sneak away from my mom in Walmart to buy the clean version of Enema of the State because Janine Lindemulder was on the cover. Then later, I bought the explicit version and switched out the booklet in the jewel case so that my mom wouldn't see the parental advisory label. I went back later to get Dude Ranch and Cheshire Cat, and I wore those out. I have incredibly fond memories of watching TRL every day just to see where All the Small Things landed.

Later, I went to the mall without my parents so that I could buy the live album, because I knew they wouldn't check my ID at the music store. I hid it in my pants all the way home. I listened to that album hundreds of times as it slowly started to become clear that the term "live" was used very loosely. But I didn't care. I still don't really care.

When we first got broadband internet, I pirated every live video I could find and burned them onto DVDs. I remember sneaking a small tv out of our guest room and into the bathroom to watch Stay Together for the Kids on Jay Leno and First Date on Conan and record them on a VHS tape. (Does anyone else remember the tape trick on a VHS cassettes that would let you record over them?)

I followed all of the weekly uploads from Cheetah during the recording of the untitled album. I had made a friend from a chat room, and we talked every day on MSN Messenger about the videos and what we expected. Despite hearing little snippets of songs, my 16 year old brain was not prepared for how much of a departure the album was going to be. I was so disappointed that I almost felt betrayed. My MSN friend and I said that the only song we even sort of liked was Go, and we didn't even really like that one. We were just grasping for anything that was familiar, and it simply wasn't there. The drum sounds were too clever. The guitars were too nuanced. There was a chorus on the bass. There were no songs about genitals, but there was a hip-hop song. What the hell is this?

I love the album now. I started to understand it a few months later when I got into music that wasn't pop punk. Finding Muse a few months later broadened my palate, and I came to love it for what it was. Now, I think it is probably the most interesting thing they have ever done. But when it came out, I wanted to burn my Dickies shorts.