Yesterday, the temperature outside warmed enough for me to roll the windows down and ride around like a hot shot. So you know what that means? Time to step on the pedal and crank the volume on those semi-embarrassing pop punk records you worshiped for a whole 2-year window of your life as if they were your life support. Well, atleast that's the code I abide to. These warm doses of jumpy guitar gladness have gotten more spins from me than anything else I own, and these were the first bands I grew manic over. I hardly give these songs the time of day anymore, but these were the germs that brought about my entire musical sickness. And when spring comes elbowing it's way through the cold this time of year, there is nothing else I want to hear but these bouncy guitars and lyrics about mean girls.

5. Saves The Day - Through Being Cool
Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned you say? Well, that's dandy and all, but I can't imagine anything worse than Chris Conley's lyrical scorn to his ex-romancer on this instant classic. This buzzing record can easily be pointed to as the root of where Fall Out Boy and Taking Back Sunday-style lyrics eventually pooled from, but none of the imitators out-wit the original.

4. Yellowcard - Ocean Avenue
If scientists could figure out a way to physically turn sunlight into 13 songs, it would sound pretty close to this.

3. Blink182 - Enema Of The State
Somewhere between pop music, surf rock, skate punk, and fart jokes is this album which is fun, serious, ridiculous, and charming all at once. It's one of those records that taught me you don't have to "grow up" to mature.

2. New Found Glory - New Found Glory
This album seemed like the newest thing in the entire world when I first bought it. For pop punk at the time, it was one of the crispest and cleanest sounding records yet, packing more pop than punk, but never sacrificing the energy or emotion.

1. Over It - Timing Is Everything
It's hard to even lump this with other pop-punk-ish records. It's more of an animated record of slick abrasive skate punk, and Pete's vocal twists and turns blow my mind to this day. It's a simple record, but it's my favorite musical grenade to pull the pin out of once in a while and blow me back a few years.