Blink-182: The Half-Naked Truth

So who are those drumheads for?

DeLonge shrugs. "Kids probably."

In the early evening, as fans file into the building, Hoppus comes up with a new policy: "No employee of Blink-182 may undress me with his eyes." Then he discovers the white board on which basketball plays can be diagrammed. "If I were a coach," he muses, "I'd be saying, 'Your intensity is for shit!' " He locates a marker and leaves a message for the student athletes of the University of Texas: "Competitive sports suck. You should all skateboard."

Outside the dressing room, there's a loud cheer from the crowd. Presumably, opening act Bad Religion have taken the stage. Hoppus has a different theory, however: "They must have shown the crowd a picture of me."

Blink-182 Play Word Association, Part Three:

"Hero"
Hoppus: Superman.
DeLonge: People in the government who have tried to reveal conspiracies and been killed or persecuted for it.
Barker: Stewart Copeland.

Travis Barker gets his own dressing room and spends most of his time there with Melissa. He listens to Method Man, works out and tries to go through the entire day without ever putting a shirt on. He enjoys the company of Hoppus and DeLonge, whom he calls "super funny," but is selfaware enough to know that a twenty-four-hour diet of fart jokes is not for him. Often, he doesn't even listen to their banter onstage but just gets ready to attack the next song. The precise violence he does to his drum kit every night makes him the band's secret weapon.

Barker, 24, thinks being on tour is like being on vacation: At home, he wakes up earlier and works harder. He owns a rehearsal studio, a beltbuckle company (Famous Stars and Straps) and a retail store — plus, he teaches drums. If he doesn't wake up at seven and start taking care of business, he spends the whole day berating himself for being a shiftless loser.

Going against the drummer stereotype, Barker is the band's quietest, most serious member. "Four years ago, I couldn't afford to feed myself," he says. "But now I can buy art, work on old Cadillacs and live in comfort. I can finally buy a dog and afford to feed him."

Two weeks later, on June 4th, Barker gets injured and has to leave the tour. Here's what happened: On an off day in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio (just outside Cleveland), Barker and Kennedy, tired of room service, took a taxi to a nearby Taco Bell to get some dinner. According to Barker, while he was in the bathroom two large redneck guys started aggressively hitting on Kennedy, an attractive, gamin redhead. They didn't recognize Barker as a rock star when he returned — they were just unhappy that the girl who had ignored them was with a skinny, tattooed freak. They kept staring at Barker and Kennedy while they were eating; getting a bad vibe, the couple left the restaurant to call a cab and go back to the hotel. "I didn't want to be a sitting duck," Barker says. While they were standing at the phone booth, a red car pulled up, and one of the intimidators got out. Barker tried to settle the guy down and displayed his hand, which was in a brace for his tendinitis, to demonstrate that he didn't want to fight. "He kept mouthing off, and then he hit me," Barker says.

"I tried to avoid a fight," Barker emphasizes. "But once he hit me, I had to defend myself." Barker toppled his larger assailant, he says, and started punching him. One of the blows he landed on the guy's face broke Barker's right pinkie, a hairline fracture. After about thirty seconds, the thug went limping back to his car, with Barker kicking him the whole way.

Barker and Kennedy called the police, but they had neglected to get a licenseplate number. Taco Bell claimed that its security cameras had not been working. "That guy was way bigger and older than me," Barker cracks. "Ohio's not that tough."

Barker thought about continuing on the tour with a drum kit set up with the electronic aids of Def Leppard's onearmed drummer, Rick Allen. The doctors advised against it, however, so the band soldiered on, playing with Dameon de la Paz, guitarist for opening act Fenix TX. "The kids aren't going to notice," says Hoppus, "but it's definitely not the same." Barker is hoping to be back on the road in August for Blink's European shows; until then, he's tinkering with his Cadillacs and typing onehanded responses to all his email (travis182@aol.com). "Can you mention that I'm answering all of them personally?" he asks.