I was emo in seventh grade.
The whole shebang, too. I wore studded belts from Hot Topic and had red hair.
I’m not ashamed of it. Frankly, if I meet someone who didn’t go through an emo phase in middle school, I don’t trust them. It’s truly a humbling experience.
All jokes aside, being emo made me love music. I knew all sorts of trivia about my favorite bands, and I saw my favorite band five times in two years alone. It was just good, clean fun that I haven’t felt since I acquired a more refined taste in music.
Everyone loves a good throwback song, but songs from your emo phase just have a special place in your heart. Even though you haven’t listened to it in years, you still know all the words because it meant so much to you that you grew up with your favorite bands. Back then, I knew everything about them: the members’ names, where they were from, their life stories, their favorite foods — I know that isn’t just me. But now when I like a band, I just listen to their music.
The really crazy thing is the emo never fully leaves you. Do I still tear up a little bit when I hear the first note of “Welcome to the Black Parade?” I definitely do. One, because that song still slaps, but also because it brings back memories of when I was most excited about music.
It felt like the artists knew exactly what you were going through and were writing directly to you, and that nostalgia is a unique feeling that’s hard to get again when you get older. I’ll never be as hardcore again as I was when I was 12, but I’ll also probably never care about music as much.
