People react to breakups in a myriad of ways. Some dye their hair, others get tattoos - and Tom DeLonge committed his life to the study of UFOs. Yep, that's right, the former lead singer of Blink 182 is releasing a three volume, non-fiction series about aliens. The first in the trilogy, Sekret Machines: Gods, hits shelves March 7.
For those of you who didn't spend their tweens sulkily drawing on their Converse sneakers and cursing "the man," California-based punk band Blink 182 was the epitome of the disrespectful skate punk aesthetic (Wikipedia more aptly describes their style as "irreverent lyrical toilet humor") that dominated MTV in the late '90s and early Aughts. "Late night/come home/work sucks/I know" - that's them. "Nobody likes you when you're 23" - also them. They were assholes but, like, in a hawt way.
Their high-energy, onstage antics were apparently mirrored offstage, however, and DeLonge left the band under contentious circumstances in 2015. And then he got into aliens. Really into aliens. In addition to Sekret Machines: Gods, which was co-written by occultist Peter Levenda, DeLonge runs a website and media company in whose mission statement is mentioned "the profound, yet unresolved mysteries involving science and the universe" (that media company is also responsible for publishing his books), and is currently involved in the production of a skateboarder alien movie.
So, yeah, like I've mentioned several times already, really into aliens.
Sekret Machines: Gods is positioned as a "companion investigative series" to a fictional thriller DeLonge worked on, Sekret Machines: Chasing Shadows, and reportedly contains interviews with a number of high level intelligence officers, scientists and military officials.
In an interview with Rolling Stone, DeLonge addressed those who may doubt his ability to land these interviews. "It’s very hard to think, ‘How did this guy in a band get access like that?’” he said. “It sounds crazy. But it’s because I can speak to a very specific audience. I earned their trust. I knew my material.”
Though it may sound extreme, DeLonge has been slowly gaining respect among certain governmental circles; his emails with John Podesta, Hillary Clinton's campaign manager, regarding their "sensitive topic," made waves last year.
"It's the opening salvo on the complacency of human institutions where the UFO Phenomenon is concerned,” said Levenda to SFGate. “It’s designed to shake people up, to make them question their assumptions.”
Hey man, it's 2017 - honestly, anything is possible.