Where Are Your Boys Tonight?

The Oral History of Emo's Mainstream Explosion 1999-2008

By: Chris Payne

Narrated by: Graham Halstead, Chris Abell

An explosive oral history of emo’s takeover from 1999 to 2008, featuring

MY CHEMICAL ROMANCE, FALL OUT BOY, PARAMORE, PANIC! AT THE DISCO, TAKING BACK SUNDAY, JIMMY EAT WORLD, DASHBOARD CONFESSIONAL, AND MANY MORE

If Meet Me in the Bathroom traced New York City's early 2000’s rock scene, Where Are Your Boys Tonight? gives the inside story of the turn-of-the-millennium emo subculture that became bigger than anyone thought possible. There was Pete Wentz, the Fall Out Boy leader who launched a litany of scene-stealing bands and preposterous side-hustles, and Gerard Way, the wizard behind My Chemical Romance and The Black Parade. Panic! At the Disco and Paramore emerged soon after—a pair of intrepid outsiders who got massive playing by their own rules. As they ascended, MySpace took over the internet and the age of influencers dawned, with emo its choice aesthetic.

Music journalist Chris Payne experienced emo's mainstream takeover from sweaty crowds and mosh pits growing up in New Jersey. In Where Are Your Boys Tonight? he offers an authoritative, impassioned, and occasionally absurd account told through interviews with more than 150 people, from the scene's biggest bands, producers, and managers to the teenage fans who helped redefine American music culture.

Supplemental enhancement PDF accompanies the audiobook.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.

©2022 Chris Payne (P)2022 HarperCollins Publishers

A walk down memory lane

What a great look into my teenage years 😅. I went to a lot of the shows they talk about, it was basically 3 days of reminiscing.

Tip: if you didn’t live the xXxRAWRxXx life, definitely download the cast of characters.

Vindicated

It was amazing hearing the history of my absolute favorite bands growing up, as a west coast kid, not knowing the beginnings of MCR, Paramore or Bayside, I heard them on MySpace like most other kids in 2003-2005, but hearing the heart behind some of the best records I’ve ever heard, gives these bands such a more human element and makes me appreciate them so much more than I did when I first heard them. Plus going back and listening to the records was a nostalgia fest. 10/10 for sure.

Thnks Fr Th Mmrs

I’ll be honest, I started the audiobook to hear from FOB because I still follow and love them to this day, but stayed for everyone else. This book provided me more insight into the genre and scene that captivated me back in the 2000s. I loved hearing first hand accounts from everyone who was a part of it not just the bands but the journalist, producers etc. it’s well put together in terms of the focus of each chapter and part of the book, and the author did a great job of putting together a cohesive narrative out of the interviews he accumulated. Highly recommend if you’re a fan of the genre or just music history in general.

A great new Millennium emo oral history!

Author Chris Payne got everyone one on the record for this amazingly oral history of emo spanning aughts and 2000 teens.

The history of my heart

I loved this book. This was my music growing up and I felt like I was reliving my history as I listened. I learned a lot about the scene that I missed because I was too young at the time, but emo music will be my heart forever.

A Must Read for Elder Emos

As a lonely middle schooler living in Southeast Louisiana in the aftermath of Katrina in 2005, I could not have been better primed to love the emo music of the mid ‘aughts. Because the genre is so dear to me on an emotional level, I’ve made a habit to steer clear of most music journalism about the genre. Payne accurately relays the way music journalists of the era (looking at you, Pitchfork) panned the genre, and I’m just not interested in hearing the music I loved growing up picked apart (just as I’m sure none of the pitchfork writers from back then want to hear Radiohead torn apart.)
If you share this fear of reading music journalism about emo music, I can assure you Payne brings none of that attitude to this writing. He celebrates the genre’s successes and ground breaking moments, while not shying away from some of its darker sides. He was able to gather countless hours of interviews with musicians from the scene, weaving their stories together seamlessly (and occasionally presenting different accounts of similar events.) It is so refreshing to read accounts of emo music as an important genre in the history of rock music, rather than just “a fad among teenage girls.” But speaking of teenage girls, Payne also does an excellent job interrogating what spoke to so many young women about the genre (and what very much did not. He is able to look back at emo’s highs and lows with the benefit of hindsight; and I think Payne’s book will become a foundational document in the history of emo.

Elder Emos Yearbook

This book was fantastic. Everything I hoped it would be and then some. It took me a second to get used to the audiobook bounce of the interviews but stick with it. Once you’re used to the format it’s an easy listen.

Starts strong but becomes all about FOB and MCR

Overall, as someone who was present for many tours and shows mentioned in this book, I really enjoyed it up until about the last 3rd or quarter of the book.

The book starts out very very detailed and granular with the New York and New Jersey hardcore and punk scenes and how they helped pave the way for the emo boom. I heard a lot of anecdotes and accounts that I never knew or had forgotten about. I loved that this book gave me context for so many bands I had heard about but never listened to or had just read in line or notes. I was very impressed with how far back they went at the beginning of this book and we're clearly able to draw a line between the late '90s and the mid-2000s.

However the book started to kind of lose me towards the end. The last third or quarter to me mostly felt like a book about Fall out boy and My chemical romance. The author touches on the emo bubble bursting but doesn't really go into how it affected so many bands. The book started out so detailed and covered so many different artists that I was hoping it would circle back to discuss or illustrate how those same artists were affected negatively when the bubble burst (the starting line for example). but by the end of the book it was mainly about Fall out boy and MCR. Much of these stories I already knew and really wanted to hear about how bands like Thursday (whom are set up as lynchpins for the entire story) dealt with the fall out. warped tour 2005 with such a large part of this book and yet warped tour 2008 or 2009 weren't touched upon. It would have been nice to see the contrast between they're more successful year (2005) And how the tour was affected as taste started to change.

I'll also add that while it was cool to get first hand accounts from people like Pete Wentz and Gabe Seporta, I feel like because people like them were so heavily featured you didn't really hear much negative things about him or others. Members of Brand new were not in this book but we're probably painted the worst of all. i think if the book was more second hand accounts it could have been more transparent about certain people and events. I appreciate the honesty about how some bands acted but it seemed odd that some got a lot of flack and others didn't (Fall out boy).

I WANT MORE!

Overall I really loved it and the cast of characters. I just wish it was longer!

The Emo Bible

As an elder emo who befriended many of those interviewed in this in the early days and attended many of the events and shows mentioned—I still finished this book learning SO much I never knew.

For those “scene-ior” citizens like me this will be a bittersweet walk down memory lane that will trigger tons of nostalgia you had buried deep beneath all the lyrics you still know by heart.

For those who are newer or younger fans of the bands that exploded from this scene like My Chem, Fall Out Boy and Paramore, this will be a deep dive history lesson that explains why there’s such a cultural divide between the newer fans and the OG fans.

I appreciate that the author was able to vividly take readers back to the early 2000’s emo glory days while still viewing it from a modern lens by acknowledging some of the problematic aspects like misogyny and homophobia that ran deep in this scene—something that I often see music writers and fans conveniently brush over when talking about their musical heroes.

Performance: 7/10. The interview-style dialogue where people are named at the beginning of every quote is odd to follow along with at first but I got used to it and wasn’t as bothered by it as some of the other reviews here. The narrator for the interviews has a voice that sounds like the weird guy you always try to avoid at the bar. Idk how else to explain it. He also mispronounces some important names like “Helena” but that could just be me being pedantic.

Story: 10/10. The author does a great job of exploring the predecessors of the bands who would become household names without being gatekeepy, covers all the bases of the bands and albums you love, and even finally explains why Bert and Gerard ended their friendship and what really went on between Brand New and Taking Back Sunday. When I finished this book I felt the same way I did when Warped Tour ended—sad that it was over but honored to have experienced such a special and unique sliver of music history.