An Oral History of AbsolutePunk.net

@Jason Tate I recently did an AMitW focus group for his upcoming album cycle. The discussion was largely focused on how his fans consume media, stay up to date on news from Andrew, etc. I did give a huge shout out to you/absolutepunk/chorus.fm and funny enough, one of the moderators and I went down a rabbit hole discussing AP. Cheers!

 

Damn - Lueda’s name takes me way back

 

Cool article! I often forget that AP’s news feed was Twitter-like in its conciseness. It must one of the first sites I consumed news in that way from.

I forgot about the Paramore AMA thing. Jogging a lot of old memories.

 

Absolutepunk will forever remind me of all the dangerous Summer drama lol those guys are idiots it was a lot more fun on there too , as they say “those were the days“

 

Would love to revisit the comments on the premiere of "Beverly Hills" in the screeenshot.

 

Ah the memories.



Also Emory lol.

 

Takes me back.
No mention of it, but weren't there "scene points" as a reputation score for a while? The more you had, the heavier your upvote/downvote of others would affect their score. That sort of thing.

Or am I totally making this up? I was fairly young at the time so the memory is fuzzy.

 

Huge formative website and years for me. Met some really great people there!

 

Thats awesome. Still cherish this username I mindlessly came up with on AP in 2002.

 

Hard to believe I’ve been visiting this place for 21 years.

 

Seeing the old homepage of AP.net sent me back about 10 years. Crazy.

Still remember the (snowflakes?) from Christmas season and discussing the hype leading up to The Dark Knight. Good times. Probably spent most of my class time in senior high on AP. Thanks for that, Jason.

 

I also had a good lol at that misspelling

 

so many good news stories on that first screenshot. that was just after i found AP.net too. it definitely was a space online that i found many bands i love today.

 

Gosh, I loved those Andrew McMahon wristbands. Wore mine for years before it finally snapped. I’m still so bummed about that. I’d still wear it if I had one!

 

That was a good article #gfytn

 

Their site is borderline unusable lol

 

similar feelings here. i lost mine at a bus stop and i was quite upset about it. it was too late to get a new one at that point.

 

Great read. I think I've been visiting since 03!

 

What a great piece. Brings back so many memories. I was *definitely* there for the screenshot that included the blurb about Weezer's Make Believe. Hahah... Member since at least 2003 (and I think probably earlier). I clearly remember all the hub-bub on the site when Deja Entendu came out, so that's the point in time when I can assuredly say I was a member.

I really miss the vibes, the community, the feel, the excitement of the scene. I have positive memories of it all.

I can see where there was some short-sightedness, lack of diversity/inclusion, and other issues underneath it all, but.... in general, it was all a very well-intentioned community surrounding the music we loved (and loved to illegally download -- which I'm sure was no small part in why it all came tumbling down).

The snowflakes on the page in wintertime were always so special. I also remember the threads where we would share all of the emo/punk/pop-punk/indie Christmas music that existed (and there was *so much*!).

With that said, I do love how Chorus.fm has evolved in ways that mirror my own journey of musical exploration and growth. Seeing posts and content here about hip-hop and Americana/alt-country/folk is wonderful -- and mostly wouldn't have been seen in the old days. Could you imagine Gillian Welch's 2001 masterpiece album "Time (The Revelator)" making headlines on the front page of AP back then? No, I can't either. But then again, I wouldn't have been able to appreciate it back then the way that I can, and do, now.

Thank you Jason and all of the folks that have contributed over the years to these 2 sites.