WTF is emo!?

OK, so not being your basic young and hip dude (though I am neither very old, nor un-hip), I've been puzzled by the term 'emo' ever since this post by a parental type.

Watching the video of a stoned-out-of-his-mind Californian dude and his even more stoned sister, I had no idea what they were talking about. No. Idea.

I was further intrigued by the somewhat cryptic dedication to a friend of mine. Why was this post "somehow for Pete"? Was there some sort of in-joke I was missing? Did Pete know what emo meant when I had no idea?? Was I rapidly falling behind the "lingo" of the youth of today!? Was I uncool!!!???

To my considerable relief, when I checked with the dedicatee, he had no idea what it was all about either.

Apparently emo means emotional hardcore and is represented by your basic black-rakishly-cut-hair-in-eyes, life-is-soooo-miserable type personages. Kind of like grunge meets goth. Kind of like this.

Still. With a slow morning in front of photoshop, I have developed my very own contribution to emo culture. I think it distills the emo mood quite accurately...