Nail the Toneblink-182

What's My Age Again?

blink-182 · Enema of the State · 1999

The intro and verse riff of "What's My Age Again?" is a bright, barely-dirty arpeggio, not the chorus distortion — a heavily modded Fender Stratocaster with a single Seymour Duncan Invader in the bridge, hit lightly through DeLonge's 1999 two-amp rig of a Mesa/Boogie Rectifier head blended with a Marshall JCM900. Keep the gain low, treble and upper mids up, bass trimmed so the picking stays snappy, and let studio-style light compression even out the attack. The knob values here are inferred from that documented rig and from the sound of the record; no one has published Jerry Finn's actual session settings.

Where these numbers come from: worked out from the documented rig and the sound of the record

Tuning

Standard tuning, no capo

Standard tuning, key of F# major (riff outlines D#m over a moving B–F#–C# bass), around 158 bpm; the arpeggio sits high on the neck near frets 9–11, and verse two trades the arpeggios for power chords.

Part: Riff

Guitar

  • Fender Custom Shop Stratocaster (single-humbucker mod) · Seymour Duncan SH-8 Invader · bridge pickup (only pickup wired)
  • Gibson Les Paul Standard (black, Invader bridge) · Seymour Duncan SH-8 Invader · bridge pickup

Amp

Mesa/Boogie Triple Rectifier

GAIN
3.0
BASS
4.0
MID
5.5
TREBLE
6.5
PRESENCE
5.5

The intro/verse riff is the near-clean, chimey sound, so these are low-gain (clean/pushed-clean channel) numbers rather than the red-channel chorus tone — for the distorted chorus power chords push gain to about 7.5, bass 5, mid 4.5, treble 7. Accounts differ on the exact Rectifier: DeLonge's period rig is widely reported as a Triple Rectifier, while some song-level write-ups name a Dual Rectifier; Rectifier heads have no reverb.

Amp

Marshall JCM900

GAIN
4.5
BASS
4.0
MID
6.0
TREBLE
7.0
PRESENCE
6.0
REVERB
2.0

DeLonge blended a Marshall with the Mesa in this era for bite and upper mids; he is reported to have run the JCM900's cleaner channel with the preamp gain well up. Guitar journalism ties the JCM900 to the Dude Ranch/Enema period, so treat the blend as period-documented rather than track-documented.

Pedals

  • dbx 160 compressor · compressor (mix-stage, inferred — not a pedal on DeLonge's board) · Light: roughly 3:1, 2–3 dB of reduction. DeLonge used essentially no effects pedals in 1999; the snap and evenness of the recorded riff come from tracking and mix compression, and a subtle comp pedal gets you close.

Tone character

near-clean with slight bite · chimey high strings · tight percussive attack · compressed and even · forward upper mids

medium

A continuous four-note arpeggio at 158 bpm that asks for an even picking hand and a held fret-hand stretch while the lowest note moves across strings.

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These are the record's settings. Tell us what you play through and we'll translate every knob to the amp you actually own — free.

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Sources