Tom DeLonge told Radio.com why he really left Blink-182, and there is more to the story than all of us had thought…
September 25, 2015
A few days ago Mark Hoppus teased new Blink-182 music on Instagram – music, recorded with Alkaline Trio’s Matt Skiba in place of Tom DeLonge. The former member has recently taken to Radio.com in order to explain why he really left the band. In the interview the musician blamed his departure on his business efforts. Here is what he had to say:
What people don’t know about me, because I’ve never been out there telegraphing it, is that I’ve been building companies for a long time and I learned quite a hell of a lot. And, the skill sets that I’ve acquired for the past 15 years in terms of understanding the monetization of the arts—I built a platform that Kanye and Nine Inch Nails and Pearl Jam would use to monetize all of their art, their fan clubs, ticketing and all that stuff—to building hard core skateboarding companies and surf companies where the culture involved is super snobby and picky.
I grew up skateboarding most of my life. I really learned how to identify with a core group of people that hated everything. So, at this point in my life I just know a lot of things and it’s a better use of the skill sets that I’ve acquired to be doing what I’m doing now than just being on stage playing the songs over and over again—even though it’s fun as shit when there’s pyrotechnics and lasers—I love that. But I’ve never needed attention to feel good about myself… even though it’s fucking awesome and I love attention, don’t get me wrong, but I need to create things. That’s where I win emotionally I guess.
I hit a very specific part in my life. I’m 39 years old. If I was to continue to stay in the studio for a year to write a record that I need to rehearse for eight weeks to go on tour for another six months, and it’s only about those twelve songs I’m going to be severely limited in what I can achieve artistically and I’m going to be looking back when I’m 50 kinda going, ‘Fuck, I really love all these other forms of art, I really wish I could have done something with it. So what happened was that I decided that… [pauses] just to do it.
I decided to do it because it afforded me the ability to be with my family a hell of a lot more. It afforded me to inspire other artists. It afforded me to use all the other skill-sets I’ve acquired of bringing people together and putting a business model to a new form of art. Guys are creating graphic novels, guys are writing books, guys are making movies, guys are making animations… I created a system of glue to pull all those people together into one vehicle and make it happen, then it’s bigger for everybody.
You can read the whole interview with the former Blink-182 guitarist at this location.
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