Rise and Fall, Rage and Grace

Untitled

Rise and Fall, Rage and Grace is The Offspring's eighth studio album, which was released on June 17, 2008 in the United States and a day earlier in Europe. This is the band's first full-length studio release in four and a half years, the longest gap between The Offspring's studio albums to date. Its release had been delayed several times since frontman Dexter Holland first announced the album in 2004.

Writing and recording sessions for this album lasted for almost two years, making it the longest time The Offspring have ever spent working on an album. Although drummer Atom Willard (who left in July 2007) was still a member of the band during the recording, session musician Josh Freese actually handled the drum tracks, like he did on the previous album Splinter. Due to contract issues with Geffen Records, Willard was not supposed to do recording on the album and later decided to leave the band and continue his duties in Angels & Airwaves full time whilst Face to Face drummer Pete Parada joined the band just in time for the tour.

The Japanese version of the record contains a thirteenth track, "O.C. Life", which is a cover written by Rikk Agnew in 1982. It has been recorded by a number of bands including hardcore punk band D.I., which Agnew played in from 1983 to 1987. It debuted at #3 in Japan with sales around 50,000, and although it debuted at #10 on the Billboard 200 in the US, a position significantly higher than Splinter's peak position at 30, its first week sales of around 46,000 were considerably lower than the debuts of its predecessors, including that of Splinter (87,000) and Conspiracy of One (125,000).

Track listing

All songs written by The Offspring, except for "O.C. Life" written by Rikk Agnew.

CD

1. "Half-Truism" – 3:26
2. "Trust in You" – 3:09
3. "You're Gonna Go Far, Kid" – 2:58
4. "Hammerhead" – 4:38
5. "A Lot Like Me" – 4:28
6. "Takes Me Nowhere" – 2:59
7. "Kristy, Are You Doing Okay?" – 3:42
8. "Nothingtown" – 3:29
9. "Stuff Is Messed Up" – 3:32
10. "Fix You" – 4:19
11. "Let's Hear It for Rock Bottom" – 4:05
12. "Rise and Fall" – 2:59

Japanese Bonus Track

13. "O.C. Life" - 2:53

LP

Side A

1. "Half-Truism" – 3:26
2. "Trust in You" – 3:09
3. "You're Gonna Go Far, Kid" – 2:58
4. "Hammerhead" – 4:38
5. "Kristy, Are You Doing Okay?" – 3:42
6. "Takes Me Nowhere" – 2:59

Side B

1. "A Lot Like Me" – 4:28
2. "Nothingtown" – 3:29
3. "Stuff Is Messed Up" – 3:32
4. "Fix You" – 4:19
5. "Let's Hear It for Rock Bottom" – 4:05
6. "Rise and Fall" – 2:59

Production and marketing

Holland first mentioned the follow-up to Splinter in 2004. "People think of greatest hits like, 'Oh, does that mean you're going into acting?'" he says, referring to the compilation album that came out in 2005. "But I really want to put out another record next year. All the new songs feel pretty good."

On February 7, 2006, Holland said in his journal that the band entered a demo studio to work on guitar tracks. "Well what's up this week? We went back in the demo studio last weekend, just Noodles and I, doing some guitar tracks. It was a blast. It feels good to get back in the studio and do some recording and just be a band, you know? I'm sure you do if you're in a band. We knocked off early because it was Noodles' birthday (remember?) and he had some ragin' to do. People are asking us about possibly doing some festivals in Europe this summer, which would be fun, but we thought it would be better to stay home and work on songs for another record. What do you think?" A week later, Holland said in his journal that he went out of town to "meet with a guy who might produce" The Offspring's new album. "Last week I went out of town to meet with a guy who might produce our next record. I thought it went really well. Right now we‘re just kind of in that mode of figuring out what the next record is gonna be like, and writing songs. Why don‘t you guys write in and tell us what you think?"

On June 13, 2006, Holland stated that the band (minus Willard) had been meeting every week and would begin recording shortly. He also confirmed that Willard had not officially left the band and was only on tour with Angels & Airwaves.

On August 18, 2006, Holland updated the band's journal, saying that they had demoed 5 songs and were looking to go into the studio soon. He described the new songs as "lots of guitar, energy, lots of energy, and good songs." and "I think it's the best stuff we've done in a long time."

In September 2006, it was announced that the album would be produced by producer Bob Rock of Metallica fame. He said that he was working with Holland and "helping him sort out songs." Recording for Rise and Fall, Rage and Grace finally began in November 2006, with an intended release date of spring 2007. Recording took place in Hawaii and California with Rock. By May 2007 the music for thirteen songs had been recorded, with a further 10 tracks demoed. At this time Dexter announced that all of the songs were completely new with no re-recordings of older songs, jokingly remarking "that would be cheating, wouldn't it?" (in response to rumors that the unreleased song "Pass Me By" and the re-recording of their 1992 song "Dirty Magic" would appear on the album) and commenting that the new tracks "sound like a friggin' freight train."

In July 2007, Dexter also confirmed that the band had finished "two more songs" and the album was being recorded in Orange County, California. On the Christmas journal entry, he claimed that he had two more lyrics to write, "a couple more" to sing and "various tweaks" to do before mixing could begin. The band was at that time taking a break to spend Christmas with their families.

In the new year, the band comically responded to upset fans who wanted news by having a "breaking news" story regarding the band buying plane tickets for their next show. In his journal, Dexter explained that when there were no updates, it's usually because there's nothing to talk about- hence the faux "news." The next month, Dexter told Bombshellzine.com that The Offspring were "just in the studio getting some tracks down for the new record" and claims "it's a lot louder than the last couple". He also said the band wasn't "going to be making another Smash, or another Ixnay" but thinks they are still "relevant to punk when they were created, and this one will be no different".

Dexter announced on April 9, 2008 that the new album was finished and announced the name and release date, and that "Hammerhead" would be the first single. According to a Finnish website, "Kristy, Are You Doing Okay?" is rumored to be the second single. However, this rumor turned out to be false; in June 2008, shortly before the album's release, the influential L.A. station KROQ began playing "You're Gonna Go Far, Kid", making it seem possible that this could be the second single, though the station has played non-singles from the band in the past. Six other stations in the Southwestern United States followed suit. During the Offspring's three May 2008 concerts in California, "You're Gonna Go Far, Kid" was the only new song besides "Hammerhead" that was played, also causing fans to believe this would be the second single.

On June 2, 2008, 30 second clips of each song on the new album were accidentally released by Amazon.com. They were removed swiftly but only after fans had ripped the clips and uploaded them to several fileshare and video sharing sites.

The official premiere of the album took place on the band's imeem site on June 9 at 3pm UTC.

Promotional tour

Main article: Rise and Fall, Rage and Grace Tour

In 2007, The Offspring first premiered "Hammerhead" at the Summersonic Festival, before any details of the new album had been revealed. The song would later be played again on the first night of the Australian Soundwave Festival, before being replaced on the set-list by "Half-Truism," which has not been played since. "Hammerhead" was then played again on the last night of Soundwave Festival. In May 2008, during their performances on X-Fest, KJEE Summer Roundup and the KROQ Weenie Roast, they also premiered "You're Gonna Go Far, Kid" alongside "Hammerhead", and have since played both songs in their sets at the Electric Festival in Spain, Rock in Rio 2008 in Portugal and Rock am Ring and Rock im Park in Germany. The band will also be playing a series of Japanese dates from October 6-21, 2008.

Reception

The reaction from fans was mostly very positive, though more mixed from critics. While Stephen Erlewine for Allmusic compared "Fix You" to Coldplay's song by the same name and gave the album 2 stars out of 5, Kerrang! gave the album a very positive KKKK review, saying that the album is "an exquisite reminder of what a fabulous band they are".

In a interview to L.A Times, Dexter Holland said:

"Who decides what is and what isn't punk? I want to write songs that people hear and feel and I want to be successful and reach a big audience," he says. "I'm not trying to be the coolest guy in the world, I'm trying to write songs that mean something to people. As you get successful, sometimes you lose one set of fans and gain another."

Charts

Charts (2008)	Peak position
United World Chart	7
ARIA Top 50 Albums Chart	3
Japan	3
UK	39
Canada	4
Swedish Album Chart	52
U.S. Billboard 200	10
Netherlands	73
Switzerland	5
Austria	7
Finland	12
Portugal	24
New Zealand	9
German Media Control Charts	13

Release dates

Release dates from The Offspring's official Web site.

Date	Countries
June 11	Japan
June 13	Austria Ireland Italy Germany Greece Netherlands Switzerland
June 14	Australia
June 16	Belgium Czech Republic Denmark France Norway Poland Portugal South Africa Slovakia United Kingdom
June 17	Canada Spain United States Asia Latin America
June 18	Finland Sweden
June 30	Brazil

Personnel

The Offspring

• Dexter Holland – Vocals, Guitar
• Noodles – Guitar, Vocals
• Greg K. – Bass, Vocals

Additional Personnel

• Josh Freese – Drums
• Bob Rock – Producer
• Chris "X-13" Higgins - Backing vocals

External links

• Trust in You in the studio #1 on YouTube
• Trust in You in the studio #2 on YouTube