ENTERTAINMENT

‘Emo music never went away – and our festival proves that’

Picture this: it’s 2005. You wake up, brush your hair into a side parting, covering one of your eyes so much so you can’t see. You apply eyeliner, and haul on your freshly-washed skinny jeans so they stick to your legs like treacle.

By Metro UK

• April 18, 2026 at 6:00 AM

‘Emo music never went away – and our festival proves that’ Photo: Metro UK

Picture this: it’s 2005.

You wake up, brush your hair into a side parting, covering one of your eyes so much so you can’t see.

You apply eyeliner, and haul on your freshly-washed skinny jeans so they stick to your legs like treacle.

You log into your social media of choice – Myspace – on your computer, check your messages, and then grab your iPod and head out to meet your friends at the park before going to see your favourite local band play.

You are – but would never admit it, of course – an Emo kid.

For many adults across the globe, this was their life for a large chunk of the early 2000s.

Myspace was their Instagram or TikTok, trends were the clothes they wore and music was watched live every weekend for a fiver or played on an iPod.

Like all movements, however, it died off.

The local bands broke up, the teenagers wiped off their eyeliner and Myspace became a digital graveyard.

But with the return of US pop-punk festival Warped Tour, Midwest Emo icons American Football releasing another new album and pop-punk themed club nights being set up, you have to ask yourself – is 2000s Emo making a comeback?

One festival that’s never dimmed its torch for Emo/Pop Punk music is the annual day festival, Slam Dunk.

Founded in 2006 in Leeds, it was originally set up after a little-known US band called Fall Out Boy performed at Leeds University’s Refectory.

They went down so well with the locals they decided to come back a year later.

As there wasn’t a gig venue large enough for the band by that point, Ben Ray, founder of Slam Dunk Records, decided to put on an outdoor gig in the city’s Millennium Square and turn it into a festival to coincide with the May Bank Holiday weekend.

It’s ended up becoming of the most successful alternative music festivals in the country, with events held in Leeds and Hertfordshire every May Bank Holiday.

To mark its 20th anniversary this year, Good Charlotte is headlining along with Knocked Loose and Sublime. The festival is Good Charlotte’s only UK performance for 2026 and their first UK gig in seven years.

‘Slam Dunk has always done well because it was current, then it was nostalgic, now it’s repeat business,’ Ben told Metro.

‘Certain American bands won’t tour anymore but they’ll still do the festival.

Other festivals are seen as right of passage festivals, but we have people who continuously come back.

They first came when they were 16, now they’re 36 and they’re still coming.

It’s also a day festival, so not a huge commitment if you have work or children and it’s accessible.

‘We’ve also grown slowly, and we’ve never relied on one act to headline for us, we’ve always had a number of headliners.

We’ve got three this year.

If people don’t like one headliner, they can just go see another.’
Ben added that while a lot of the attendees are now in their 20s and 30s, the younger generation are also coming through now too.

‘Things like Spotify and Amazon Music assist us with their algorithms and create playlists for new fans of bands,’ Ben said.

One band who demonstrably influenced the early 2000s era is Jimmy Eat World.

While the Arizona-hailed group don’t classify themselves as Emo, their critically-acclaimed albums Clarity (1999) and Bleed American (2001) paved the way for numerous bands to follow in the era.

The band is now celebrating Bleed American’s 25th anniversary this year, with a headline gig at Gunnersbury Park in west London in August.

Jim Adkins, lead singer for Jimmy Eat World, said one benefit he feels to the Emo genre is how diverse it is.

He told Metro: ‘Trends go up and down and I think we’re in a time where everything is niche to some degree.

‘A lot of these bands are people who have been around for a while, have a long history of recording music and touring, and I feel a lot of these groups have music that has stood up over time.

So why wouldn’t they be doing it now?

‘The kinds of musicians and records that fit under the large umbrella of Emo, there’s a lot happening there.

It feels a bit more varied than something like Rockabilly.’
Outlining how the music industry has changed for bands nowadays, he said: ‘I would say the biggest difference between now and then is there is a constant need for self-promotion, which doesn’t serve your creative process’, Jim said.

‘You’ve got to have your thumbnail in a certain way on social media or the algorithm won’t pick it up, which is crazy.

‘There’s never been a better time now to be a music fan as you have an unfiltered access to everything in your pocket.

But it’s never been harder for new bands because you’ve got to break through and get attention.’
One thing that helped bands hugely in the early 2000s was Myspace.

It was a place where they could post tour dates, chat with fans and upload tracks to their profile pages.

The music player, an integral part of Myspace, led Ben to find an unsigned band from Weybridge, in Surrey, called You Me At Six.

‘When I was building Slam Dunk, I realised all these bands I was working with that were getting big were American, and I fancied managing a band.

So I went on the music player on Myspace and changed the filters to Emo, Pop Punk, UK only and unsigned and You Me At Six popped up,’ he said.

‘I then managed them and put out their first album on Slam Dunk Records.’
Another two UK bands that really benefitted from Myspace were Manchester-based The Maple State and Ipswich-based Basement.

Both of the bands formed in the noughties and, despite being based in different parts of the country, have had similar experiences in navigating the music industry.

In recent years, both The Maple State and Basement have taken breaks to pursue education or other careers but reconnected during the Covid-19 pandemic, which has led to them releasing new albums.

The Maple State’s third album, Don’t Take Forever, was released in November 2025 and Basement’s fifth album, Wired, is being released on May 8.

Andrew Fisher, lead singer of Basement, told us: ‘We were massively involved in our pop punk scene as there wasn’t really a pop punk, hardcore or emo scene in Ipswich, but it did have its very own strong older punk scene going back to bands like The Addicts.

‘We were contacting church halls, pubs, community centres to put on our own shows and invite bands in.

It then became more about championing our friends and the community aspect of it.’
Greg Counsell, lead singer of The Maple State, said: ‘We first got our start because there was a website called Mancpunks, and that had all the gigs around Manchester.

We had a following there, and then it came through to Myspace – that is how we reached people outside Manchester.’
He added the website allowed them to do bold things, such as track down the manager of US rock band Motion City Soundtrack, who later then took them on tour and later introduced them to Mark Hoppus, the bassist of Blink 182.

Greg explained: ‘There was a naviety to what we did and that played into our appeal.

In terms of the music we made, we just did exactly what we wanted to do without thinking about how it was perceived or how it would track numbers-wise.’
Both Greg and Andrew said that, despite taking their respective time away from the scene, both of the bands came back to fans – old and new – who were buzzing at the prospect of hearing new music from them.

‘When we put out our previous record in 2018 and then went away, The Maple State kind of took on a life of its own on the internet,’ Greg said.

‘When we played an anniversary show last year, we had people who came over from America to see us, which kind of blows my mind.’

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Andrew said: ‘Basement took a break initially for one year, but then it turned into three because of Covid, and we realised we really missed each other.

‘The last record we put out was probably the worst time we could have put out a record – for us and for guitar music – as no one cared about it.

But people really care now, so I’m really super grateful that that things seem to be aligning really well.’
So, do they think Emo is making a comeback?

Andrew said: ‘I’m hesitant to talk about it as if it’s coming back because I don’t want it to take away from what it was, or take away from what it could be.’
He added that he had seen a resurgence of things that drew him to the movement in the first place.

‘People are now having the opportunity to be excited, not just about emo music, but about guitar music, the idea of being in a band, being creative and not having this polished, radio-friendly stuff that I was so against as a young person.’
Ben added: ‘I don’t think it ever went away.

My festival is a testament to that.

We started at the birth of this style of Emo, we’ve continued ever since, and we’ve grown from strength to strength.’
Agreeing with Ben, Greg said: ‘I feel like it never really went away.

There’s been amazing Emo music since the 80s.

‘I feel like the spotlight went elsewhere, but if you look at bands like Pup, The Hotelier, The Menzingers, these bands have been constantly putting out incredible music that I would consider to be emo punk.

‘I think what’s happening now is a different thing…it’s a nostalgic retreading of people’s youth.’