Blink-182 'More Than Halfway Through' New Album, Says Travis Barker

Artists in this Article

blink-182

Travis Barker

Lil WayNE

Transplants

Currently on the road with Lil Wayne to promote his first solo album, "Give the Drummer Some," Travis Barker predicts he'll do another record of his own -- but that might not be for a while with new blink-182 and Transplants projects on the horizon.

"They're all very different," Barker tells Billboard.com about his assorted activities. "It's easy for me to separate them. When I was finishing my album, I was starting on the blink album, starting on a Transplants record, but they're separate and all three are so different that it was really easy to go in and write for each of them...nothing was sounding similar."

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Barker says blink-182, which reunited in 2009 after a four-year split, is "a little more than halfway through" its next album, which bandmates Mark Hoppus and Tom DeLonge are working on in Los Angeles while Barker is on the road. "Right now I get a lot of stuff sent to me over the Internet, so when I get home I can do my thing," explains Barker, who finishes the Lil Wayne tour on April 29. "I talk to Mark through e-mail every day."

At this point, Barker adds, "It's hard to say what everything's going to sound like because it's not finished. It does feel exactly where it should be, where we left off with the self-titled (album in 2003). They feel like they could be disc two of that album, so far."

The album's title and timetable is up in the air right now, but Barker notes that, "I believe we're planning on turning it in in July and out hopefully in the summer. I think a summer tour and summer album would be nice, but I can't really say anything yet."

Transplants -- Barker's band with Rancid's Tim Armstrong and Skinhead Rob Alston -- started working on their third album and follow-up to 2005's "Haunted Cities" shortly before the blink-182 reunion. And, according to Barker, the trio has continued to work together when schedules align.

"I think we have 16 songs already," he notes. "We're very, very quick with writing, and spontaneous. I think we plan on maybe writing 30 songs and picking 12 to 15 and putting them out. The others will be featured on deluxe editions and B-sides and other cool things we plan on releasing."

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There's no word on a Transplants release date, either, but Barker is confident that album can surface this year along with blink-182's. Meanwhile, he's perfectly happy being on the road with Lil Wayne and his Young Money/Cash Money cohorts.

"I've never seen arena rap in my whole life," Barker marvels. "I've seen arena rock forever, and I've been to small hip-hop shows, but this is a trip to see. Wayne's filling arenas all around the world and just killing it. It's pretty awesome, man. I'm pretty proud of him and just seeing how far the whole thing has come, you know?"