What’s my age again?

What a week it has been in the world of music for a child of the nineties.

Waking up on Tuesday morning past to the news that the one-and-only Oasis are set to reform for a world tour next year was merely the icing on the cake following a trip to Belfast on Monday to see Californian pop-punk legends, Blink-182, who are currently on a major comeback tour themselves.

That’s right – with bassist, Mark Hoppus, having recently recovered from cancer, and guitarist, Tom DeLonge, back in the ranks, the foul-mouthed trio took to the stage in the SSE Arena, Belfast, on Monday night after a long and painful wait, with the show having been postponed from September 2023.

Celebrating 30 years since their formation, and with the release of their latest chart-topping album, ‘One More Time’, the future is looking brighter than ever for a band, who, despite their humorous antics, have been through many dark times in their career.

Having originally split-up at the height of their success in 2004, the band would go on to reunite in 2009 when drummer Travis Barker survived a harrowing plane crash.

Fast forward to 2015, and the band parted ways with guitarist DeLonge, as he embarked on a somewhat secretive mission, working alongside numerous US government officials in a bid to release classified information surrounding the likes of UFOs and alien lifeforms – another rabbit hole for another time, if you will.

In 2022, the band announced the return of founding member, DeLonge, alongside the new album and world tour.

Taking to the stage in Belfast last week following two nights headlining Reading and Leeds festival in England, the band played a career-defining set to a jam-packed arena.

The room vibrantly lit up as Barker started the show with the electric, iconic and familiar drum beat that introduces their 2003 hit single, ‘Feeling This’.

The first half of the set was a perfect combination of classic, but somewhat lesser known fan-favourites, alongside a handful of newer tracks such as ‘Dance With Me’ and ‘More Than You Know’, leaving room at the end of the night for some of their more recognisable earworms, such as ‘All The Small Things’ and ‘What’s My Age Again?’.

One notable factor of their performance was DeLonge’s vocal performance.

Having always been renowned for his unorthodox, nasally voice, and despite recent reports that he had been unwell, he still sounded better than he has on any of the previous three occasions that I have seen the band over the last 20 years, powering through many of those polished classics with refined aggression and attitude.

The undeniable highlight of any Blink-182 show, however, has always been the drumming skills of the one-and-only Travis Barker.

Probably one of the most, if not the most, famous drummer on the planet right now, Barker truly is the glue the holds the group together – a man capable of entertaining an audience on his own, never mind with a full band.

Whilst I could ramble on for hours about the bands hilarious stage antics and banters, I’ll save the reader the hassle of penning an inevitable complaint about the language I would have to use to sincerely portray it. But it was all just a bit of craic at the end of the day.

As I awoke on Tuesday morning in a pint-stained T-shirt that was snatched up at the merchandise stall, delighted to have witnessed my teen idols take to the stage for a fourth time, my mind moved onto the next big plan of action – getting Oasis tickets.

So, here I go, back on the nineties nostalgia train.

A train that, it seems, won’t cease in its tracks for anyone or anything these days – not even the first of many inevitable fist fights between the Gallagher brothers.