Culture 3 min read By Mason Emerson
Mark Hoppus joins Jimmy Eat World onstage at the Hollywood Bowl
Blink-182 bassist Mark Hoppus made a surprise appearance with Jimmy Eat World during the band's Bleed American anniversary show in Los Angeles, performing on "A Praise Chorus."
Blink-182 bassist Mark Hoppus made a surprise appearance on stage with Jimmy Eat World at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles on November 7, joining the band for "A Praise Chorus," the second track on their 2001 album Bleed American. The performance took place during a night when Jimmy Eat World played the album in full as part of its 25th anniversary celebrations, turning one of the record's most familiar songs into a moment shared between two bands that have long been linked.
Bleed American was released in 2001 and produced singles including "The Middle" and "Sweetness," the latter two of the album's songs that have remained central to the band's catalogue. The anniversary tour began in June at Red Rocks Amphitheatre in Colorado and continues through 2026. Each show is built around a complete performance of the record, and the Hollywood Bowl date stood out because a guest from one of the band's longtime peers took the stage in the middle of the album's run.
The appearance also reflects a history that dates back to the start of the 2000s. Jimmy Eat World opened Blink-182's 2001 tour, and the two groups later joined Green Day on the 2002 Pop Disaster Tour. The bands' ties were personal as well as professional: Jimmy Eat World played at the 2001 wedding reception of Tom DeLonge, the Blink-182 guitarist and vocalist, a detail that shows how closely the two groups were connected during that period.
Hoppus has spoken about how much Jimmy Eat World influenced his own band. In 2020, during an appearance on Adkins's podcast, he said the group's work played a role in Blink-182's choice of producer, Mark Trombino. Hoppus's comments placed the influence in concrete terms, pointing to a specific creative decision rather than a general admiration. Adkins, for his part, has said that the meaning of Bleed American is now being discovered by newer listeners who came to the album long after its release. He said the anniversary sets were designed to present the record as a complete arc rather than a collection of singles, giving audiences the chance to hear the album in the order its makers intended.
The Hollywood Bowl show therefore offered a clear illustration of that approach. Rather than a short celebratory set, the concert gave the album room to unfold from start to finish, and the guest spot on "A Praise Chorus" added a moment that tied the anniversary to the friendship and shared history behind it. The tour's continuing run through 2026 suggests that the format is intended to reach audiences well beyond a single night in Los Angeles.
Source: nme.com
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