Studio Album · No. 1
Cheshire Cat Songwriting Credits by Blink-182
Produced by Mark Trombino · Engineered by Steve Kravac (recording), Jeff Forrest (mixing)
Holds writing credit on 16 of 16 tracks
Authorship Breakdown 16 / 16 documented
Scored across the 16 tracks with documented writers, by whether Blink-182 carries a lyricist or composer credit.
Share of the 16 tracks where a band member is credited, by role.
By the Numbers
Cheshire Cat was produced by Otis Barthoulameu and recorded at Westbeach Recorders in Los Angeles, with Steve Kravac engineering and Jeff Forrest mixing. All songs are credited to Tom DeLonge, Mark Hoppus, and Scott Raynor as a trio, a collective writing mode that predates the song-by-vocalist split that would define Enema of the State and later albums. Released on the independent Cargo Records for approximately $5,000, the album captures Blink-182 before major-label polish: faster, rawer, and closer to their Bad Religion and Descendents influences than the radio-friendly pop punk they would go on to define.
Cheshire Cat is the debut studio album by blink-182, released in February 1995 on Cargo Records, recorded for approximately $5,000 and capturing the San Diego pop-punk trio at their most stripped and raw, before the mainstream commercial breakthrough that would arrive with Enema of the State in 1999. Tom DeLonge, Mark Hoppus, and Scott Raynor wrote all material; the album's 14 tracks are shorter, faster, and closer to hardcore punk influences than the melodic pop-punk of the later catalog, with 'M+Ms,' 'Carousel,' and 'Sometimes' among the principal tracks. The album did not chart on initial release but accumulated substantial sales after Enema of the State made the band famous, demonstrating the commercial long-tail of debut albums by artists who achieve subsequent major-label success. Cheshire Cat is primarily significant as a historical document of the band's pre-major-label period and as evidence of the punk and hardcore influences that the cleaner Enema production would subsequently smooth over. The album has been certified platinum in the United States through cumulative sales driven by the retrospective audience.