[3] They are considered forefathers of the emo genre, and have been widely credited as being an influence, both by contemporaries Saves the Day and later bands such as Fall Out Boy, Taking Back Sunday and the Wonder Years.

The album was recorded in only two days, with the band leaving on Friday after Ryan Pope got out of school and finishing in the early hours of Sunday morning.

[9] After the show, the members of the two bands became close friends, eventually leading them to record a split 7-inch produced by Ed Rose entitled "The Get Up Kids / Coalesce".

[9] The band continued to tour relentlessly, making connections with the likes of Jimmy Eat World, Mineral, and Boys Life, largely playing basement shows and building a dedicated fan base through word of mouth.

Their work together on the Reggie and the Full Effect album led Pryor to invite Dewees to collaborate with the Get Up Kids on Red Letter Day, a five-track EP produced by Ed Rose to fulfill their two-record deal with Doghouse.

[9] After the release of Red Letter Day, Dewees became a full-time member as the band began recording their second studio album in Los Angeles in June 1999 with producer Alex Brahl.

The album's lyrics reflected the record label strife the band had experienced and their distance between friends and family back home after their move to Los Angeles.

[9][16] Not only did the album make the Get Up Kids the poster children for emo, but it also launched the genre into a public consciousness broader than the scattered local scenes that had previously embraced it.

[18][3] As well as touring Europe, Japan, and Australia, they shared bills with acts such as Green Day, the Anniversary, Hot Rod Circuit, Jebediah, Weezer and Ozma.

Venues booked months in advance could no longer hold the demand by the time the band arrived in town and fans were forced to stand outside to see them perform.

[9] The strength of the album's sales eventually led Interscope Records to purchase a minority stake in Vagrant, and cemented the label's credibility with other up-and-coming bands.

"[21] Speaking about the change in the band's dynamic and artistry around this time, Pryor believes "[Rob & Ryan Pope's] musicianship and the way [they] were, like, locking together took a much more mature jump from Something to Write Home About to On a Wire, Jim was starting to become more of a lead guitar player, we were thinking about it more.

"[21] The band spent a great deal more time than in the past demoing songs, eventually sending them to their manager Rich Egan, who was skeptical of the new sound.

"[25] In his review of the album, Rolling Stone writer Barry Walters wrote "On a Wire quivers with the anxieties that must have arisen as the Get Up Kids left behind what originally made them.

[9] Using the financial and critical success of Something to Write Home About, Vagrant signed several other headlining emo bands such as Alkaline Trio, Dashboard Confessional, and Saves the Day.

Pryor commented on the album, saying "We really didn't give two shits if anyone liked the record or not, we were really confident that we were going to kill this 'emo' stigma that we had and take the people with open minds with us and leave everyone else in the dust.

James Dewees was involved in a difficult divorce, and much of his creative efforts inspired by those events went into the fourth Reggie and the Full Effect album Songs Not to Get Married To.

[33] They embarked on a national farewell tour, ending the band after a sold-out show on July 2, 2005, in their hometown of Kansas City at the Uptown Theater.

Matt Pryor continued as part of the New Amsterdams, an acoustic alt-country group he had formed in 2000, expanding its sound and solidifying its previously revolving-door lineup.

[39] After his second album, May Day, Pryor announced that he would be formally disbanding the New Amsterdams in favor of his solo career, concluding the band's tenure with the release of Outroduction, a B-sides compilation.

[40][41] The album was released on Curb Appeal Records, an independent label Suptic founded with former Get Up Kids collaborator and local musician Alex Brahl.

[43] After the breakup of the Get Up Kids, James Dewees began performing with New Found Glory as their touring keyboardist, having previously played on their 2003 album Catalyst.

After moving to New York City, he began to attend rehab, a process which would inspire the fifth Reggie and the Full Effect album, Last Stop: Crappy Town.

[46] In late August and September 2008, while Dewees was touring with Reggie and the Full Effect, he began making hints that the Get Up Kids would be reuniting to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the band's second album Something to Write Home About.

After There Are Rules largely failed to find an audience, the members of the Get Up Kids took another short hiatus working non-music industry jobs,[67] interrupted only by brief weekend tours and one-off shows.

[76][77] The Get Up Kids have cited numerous bands as influences, including Superchunk,[74][76] Jawbreaker, Fugazi,[74] Rocket from the Crypt, Sunny Day Real Estate, Cap'n Jazz,[78] Vitreous Humor,[79] and Jimmy Eat World.

In a 2017 retrospective on Four Minute Mile, Vice Media said that "Along with bands like Lifetime and Hot Water Music, The Get Up Kids developed a sound that was certainly responsible for the future of emo.

[85] The Canadian post-hardcore band Silverstein has cited the Get Up Kids as a major influence, and covered their song Coming Clean for a split 7-inch with August Burns Red in 2013.

[86] Dan Campbell of the Wonder Years has cited the band as one of the artists who made him want to become a musician, going so far as to name his company after the Get Up Kids' track "Forgive & Forget" from Eudora.

'"[90] New Found Glory's frontman Jordan Pundik states that the namesake of their band was partly influenced by the song A Newfound Interest in Massachusetts.