The Offspring

Rise And Fall, Rage And Grace (2008)
Sony Music Entertainment

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Contributed by: ivano
(others by this writer | submit your own)
Published on July 29th 2008

I don't really believe reviews are useful, nowadays. It takes so little to download or stream the album that reading someone else's opinion won't change your mind on listening to it. Unless of course what interests you is what other people think about it, which is I think the reason why there are still so many reviews around. So most of you have probably already listened to this album, and made you idea on it. Here's mine.

Offspring was the first punk band I ever listened to. Back when Americana was out I fell in love with these guys, and since then I haven't missed a show (they've been very few though) or a record, including of course the older ones.

Since that album their style has remained pretty much the same, and because of that listening to Rise & Fall, Rage & Grace was somehow like re-listening to Americana for the first time: same tunes, but new ones. And this is also why I can't avoid loving it, just like I love everything they’ve made since 1989. So as I said, nothing new under the sun. The ones familiar with The Offspring know they’ve always cloned themselves, copied their own songs, and this record is no exception, only now they are, say "taking inspiration" from other bands as well. The piano intro to the first track "Half-Truism" is exactly like Muse's "Newborn," while the slow chorus sounds reminds a bit of My Chemical Romance's "Helena." Despite all that the song is very powerful with a typical Offspring verse, whoo-hoos, fast paced and all. The verse of "Trust In You," the guitar riff and the drums mainly, is almost identical to "Smash," and "You're Gonna Go Far Kid" features a chorus which is a rip off from Muse again, this one being "Time Is Running Out." Both songs I like anyway, the former classic melodic hardcore, the latter with its almost dance drums, whose compressed sound is definitely well produced. The first single "Hammerhead" is another typical Offspring fast song, with some nice screams form Dexter at the end, sadly almost the only ones in the album. "A Lot Like Me" is a rock ballad, which they're pretty good at writing, and despite being maybe a little cheesy it's not so different from the older ones, like "Gone Away" or "Denial, Revisited."

I'd say these first five songs are the better part of the record. "Takes Me Nowhere" is a mid-tempo, not good and not bad, "Kristy Are You Doin Ok" is almost acoustic and almost boring. "Nothingtown" and "Stuff Is Messed Up" are two triplets songs, both catchy and especially the former very Green Day sounding. Speaking of which, "Fix You" besides being probably the worst song on the record is also a bad rip off of "Wake Me Up When September Ends." "Let's Hear It From Rock Bottom" has a melancholic sort-of-reggae verse and some nice lyrics about apathy, and the final title track is as someone noted a mix between (once again) Green Day's "American Idiot" and "The Loved Ones' 100k," not too bad anyway.

So, I'm not looking for and I don't expect many new ideas in punk rock anymore, and most of the times when I come across some they sound pretentious and artificial. What I enjoy is when the old style is well played and in my opinion The Offspring can really do that.

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Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not respon sible for them in any way. Seriously.

majorthreat (October 29, 2011)

Not 1 good song, worst Offspring album ever no competition

boogaloo (March 26, 2009)

the only good songs are half truism and you're gonna go far kid.

consider_the_ravens (March 24, 2009)

Although many of the lyrics are cheesy as hell and i dont think the album is as good as it could have been i still think its a fun cd to listen to.

MATKO5000 (August 2, 2008)

Great Album, pure brilliance! Not doing the same thing all the time like a lot of other bands!

MATKO5000 (August 2, 2008)

Great Album, pure brilliance! Not doing the same thing all the time like a lot of other bands!

lushj (July 31, 2008)

Arg. Just finished listening to this again. It's almost all commercial alt-rock. There's a few good songs- including the title track which is VERY Green Day- but the rest of it is just too slick.

In the totally misleading review above, I think this sentence is the MOST wrong:
"Since that album their style has remained pretty much the same, and because of that listening to Rise & Fall, Rage & Grace was somehow like re-listening to Americana for the first time: same tunes, but new ones."

The mid-tempo alt-rock-ish ones on "Americana" are SO much better than these. Fuck, I really like Offspring & have always stuck up for them, but this makes 3 records in a row that maybe have 1 good record's worth of songs among them. Kind of a drawn-out "Sandinista" thing, I guess.

jacknife737 (July 31, 2008)

Goddamn we need an edit button. *me* not *be* and *you're* not *your*

jacknife737 (July 31, 2008)

@sfbarker please tell be your being facetious.

RoyalWithCheese (July 31, 2008)

pretty fly for a white guy

sfbarker (July 31, 2008)

They also blatantly ripped the albums title from the Foo Fighters...they're businessmen trying to make some money. Worst of the original Epitaph bands....

thedudeovethere (July 31, 2008)

I don't like this cd but i like all them older

holy_balls (July 31, 2008)

i think goatees are stupid. i hate larry the cable man

usversusthem (July 31, 2008)

To be honest, the only Offspring I'd ever heard before this year was the snippets of "Pretty Fly for a White Guy" they played at Montreal Canadiens games back around when it came out. When I became aware of them as an actual punk band, everything I heard about them made me uninterested, and I sort of built up this idea about how they were terrible unimaginative pop punk written by people with artistic ethics not unlike Tim Armstrong's, only with less of a punx attitude. With this album coming up, I decided to stop being pig-headed and actually listen to Hammerhead, though. It confirmed all my worst fears. Score is for bands that remind you why humanity is so worthless most of the time.

Grue (July 31, 2008)

Well, Americana was the first punk album I listened to. Now I'm into all this orgcore stuff, but I still like Americana. This album, on the other hand, sucks. I listened to it once, and had no desire to listen to it ever since. Hammerhead is the only song that catched my attention.

kevinskapunk (July 31, 2008)

It's amazing that someone could get into punk at all with "Americana" being the first punk album they listened to.

Seriously, Ignition rocked shit and it's pretty much been downhill since then, especially that token song they have on every album that doesn't sound like any of their other shit, but then it ends up being the single. Think about it..."Come Out and Play"? "Pretty Fly for a White Guy"?

thomas7155 (July 30, 2008)

What the hell punknews? I gave you guys a review for this weeks ago.

TheMike (July 30, 2008)

In all fairness, the band will write what the band wants to play. Be thankful they still write any fast songs at all.

SydBarrett420 (July 30, 2008)

I don't think it's fair to have a review written by someone whose first introduction to Offpsring was "Americana".

JayTee (July 30, 2008)

This album is okay, but I agree with FallingUpwards.

WRITE A GODDAMN FAST ALBUM.

fallingupwards84 (July 30, 2008)

something that i've never understood about aging punk bands who were in their prime in the 90s, such as the Offspring, MxPx, whoever, you name it...

there's a very simple request from the fans every single album:
PLAY FASTER.

i dont understand why that is so hard for some of these older bands to do. they keep writing mid-tempo songs and get average-mediocre reviews every album because of it. its not like they're on the path to MTV play either... that time is long past; they're never going to go gold ever again or anything. so why not just play what the fans want to hear? is it THAT difficult?

INDW (July 30, 2008)

Man, i guess like the reviewer and a lot of others on this site americana were my first tentative steps into this murky old world. Perhaps because of that I've always given the offspring the award in the offspring Vs green day conversation that occurred about 3 times a week back in the day.

But you have to admit, whatever you think of American Idiot green day have just left this lot behind now. I agree with the general consensus; 3 strikes and you're out. call it quits guys.

kraze (July 30, 2008)

This bands existance in 2008 is a joke.

"You're gonna go far kid" is the worst song i've ever heard. Not only is the song more corny than that funky town cover single from the last record, but "dance, fucker, dance"? really? I mean....really?

Deadpan (July 30, 2008)

The one song I heard off this sounds like everything I've heard by them since Americana, terrible vocal production included. I don't get how people are still buying their records.

Seriously though, fuck the production on Dexter's vocals. It's so damn horrible.

stuckinbielers (July 30, 2008)

"Since that album their style has remained pretty much the same"

Jesus what an understatement

el_matt (July 30, 2008)

While i haven't listened to this album yet, i am on the same page as the reviewer, Americana was my first punk album. I was 11 at the time, and it was 10 years ago (time flies!), so i really don't get all these comments calling out the reviewers credibility just because of the fact that Americana was his first album too.

VictorIkpeba24 (July 30, 2008)

I listened just once, and found it horrible, except for one song that is awesome and 2-3 that are OK. Maybe I have to listen to it again, I had great hopes but was hugely disappointed when I heard that the other songs of the album didn't sound nothing like Hammerhead. Americana had more good songs and less shit ones, so the comparison is a bit generous in my opinion.

MsJustinChris (July 30, 2008)

Don't have time to read the review right now, but I read the first paragraph and saw the reviewer mentioned something about the Offspring's sound remaining the same since Americana.

Agreed. The sound is the same, and I do love Americana. However, what ruins the newer albums for me is that while the sound is essentially the same, it is much slower. And it just doesn't sound very good when that type of music is played slowly.

lushj (July 30, 2008)

Wow, I've never read that opinion about reviews.

I read reviews BEFORE buying or downloading a record. I'm not interested in wasting memory space or downloading time on something I know nothing about. I'd rather stream it here, on their site, or on myspace before buying it.

I'll probably end up buying this anyway, even though the stream I heard wasn't too exciting on 1st listen.

punk_rawk_show (July 30, 2008)

I do not think of the Offspring when i listen to this album.

However that said, i fucking love this album. Sure its not very punk rock, but its damn catchy.

Your gonna go far kid is prob my favorite song released this year

the_problem_with_fire (July 29, 2008)

These guys need to hang it up. This album art is still horrible, like, not even as good as your local highschool numetal band's first album artwork

rocktopus (July 29, 2008)

"Ixnay" is the only record by these guys I will regularly rotate.

WilliamZabka (July 29, 2008)

As someone who likes both the Offspring and Muse.... I just need to say your musical comparisons to both bands are complete falsehoods.

pricey123 (July 29, 2008)

i get an andrew wk vibe from the intro on nothingtown

maladroit (July 29, 2008)

stop listening to fucking muse and green day so much

655321 (July 29, 2008)

The Offspring was the first punk band you got into when they put out Americana? Fuck, I'm old.

nameless (July 29, 2008)

I used to love these a couple of years ago. Not really super into them now, but I'll admit that I really like "You're Gonna Go Far, Kid."

alex101 (July 29, 2008)

In my opinion, this record is almost The Offspring's best one since Conspiracy of One (I actually despise Splinter). All these years since no album in 5 years, I had been waiting very patiently and when I bought it a few days after it was out, I immediately started to like it. And on that note, Rise and Fall is just the greatest comeback album ever!

jacknife737 (July 29, 2008)

I’m not really expecting it to get a lot of love from here, but as a fan, its definitely their best since Americana. Stuff like You’re Gonna Go Far Kid/ Half Truism and Trust In You are arguably the best stuff they’ve ever written. If you haven’t paid attention to the band since Smash, don’t act surprised if you don’t like it.

Funny though, i was surprised that it took this long to review it; i was actually going to give it a shot for my first .org review, but i guess that isn't happening.

telegraphrocks (July 29, 2008)

Seven seems right. Maybe 7.5

Of the 12 songs, I really enjoyed 9 of them. I think it opens great (first 4 songs), and aside from the 3 shit-stinks, the rest is still good, just not as good as the first four.

Definitely better than their last two.

TheMike (July 29, 2008)

Good album... This is how Conspiracy of One would have sounded if it didn't suck.

greenerton (July 29, 2008)

why do people spend half their reviews talking about how a band is their favorite band ever and they go to all their shows...it just destroys their credibility and shows how biased the review is.

Mrdogg45 (July 29, 2008)

Come on man, Splinter wasn't too bad.

Especially when you consider how lame this and Conspiracy of One is. May pale compared to Ignition or Smash, but the late records make Splinter sound like the second coming.

XCARLUPANDDIEX (July 29, 2008)

best offspring album since americana. which means, well, better than conspiracy of one and splinter, two of the worst albums EVER. not a lot, but still ...

mikek (July 29, 2008)

The first punk album you listened to was "Americana"? Somebody revoke this kids' license!

Piata (July 29, 2008)

Usually they can pull a few great songs out of an album but this one kind of falls flat on it's face. Old Offspring was great. New Offspring is just too much blah.

historypeats (July 29, 2008)

I can't believe the reviewer fucked up the song "Fix You" is ripping off. How were you guys NOT inundated by repeated plays of Snow Patrol's "Chasing Cars" two years ago? Listen to the chorus of that song - "If I lay here..." and on - and listen to "Fix You." Same notes, same melody, same everything. I was just surprised they didn't get sued.

fallingupwards84 (July 29, 2008)

i still can't believe they used that "art" for their cover

looks like something i would have made on the Windows 95 version of Paint

penis (July 29, 2008)

youve obviously been listening to too much muse and green day. fuckin stupid review. the whole thing was fuckin stupid but if i had to pick one part, id have to say the first paragraph is the most stupid.

dazed (July 29, 2008)

listened to the stream of it. despite the gimmick singles this band used to be able to throw in a few really good album tracks but now not so much.

theonetruebill (July 29, 2008)

http://airraidlive.com/review.php?id=57

Giving this two stars seems generous. I really haven't listened to this since the last listen through to get a review up.

Mrdogg45 (July 29, 2008)

This is the one band that I've kept coming back to, like a dog or a battered woman. This album is so bad, however, that I can finally be free. I can honestly say I'll never buy this band's stuff again.

SloaneDaley (July 29, 2008)

score is for having to listen to this band in my buddies car all through high school.

threechordsandthetruth (July 29, 2008)

This review doesn't sound like it's 3.5 star record. It's a poor re-hash of their (and their peers') better days. Give it up, Dexter. I mean, I loved them too back in the day, but they can't keep riding on Ixnay forever.

baseball (July 29, 2008)

There's a decent song or two at the beginning, but there's some really awful ones outside of that. Pretty much what I expected.

mattp330 (July 29, 2008)

agreed. not horrible, but its over

mattramone (July 29, 2008)

As much as I love these dudes, they really do need ot hang it up.