10 Albums That Will Make You Love Emo

Since the dawn of the '00s, the distinction between emo and pop punk started to significantly blur. While emo had some background in the punk community as far back as the '80s, there was no question that the next generation banked on that appeal, with everyone from Paramore to Fall Out Boy rising to prominence with songs that felt like they were ripped out of a teenage romantic comedy. Emo was about to enter its golden age, and Jimmy Eat World got in early before the first waves eventually crashed.

For as much as people remember this album for the '00s singalong the Middle, that might be the most optimistic that the album gets, with the title even needing to be changed following the tragedy of 9/11 a few days before its release. There's a lot of pop punk sounds on here to be sure, but you can also hear a healthy respect for the old school punk scene as well, like the jagged guitars on the title track and Jimmy actually sounding a lot closer to a band like Sunny Day Real Estate than Blink 182.

The real strength behind this genre has always been the heartbreaking stuff though, and Hear You Me may be one of the saddest songs to come out of the scene, as Jimmy talks about fans that have passed away and how he hopes that angels lead them into the next life. In an era when emo was starting to become more of a fashion, we needed a record like this to remind us what the genre was really all about.