Rise Against's Tim McIlrath recently participated in a bit of a retrospective interview looking back on the history of his popular political punk/hardcore band. Tim credits the openmindedness of the band's audience, noting:

Our audiences are really growing hungry and engaged. Our audience is people who have questions about the world around them; they're trying to look toward their favorite bands or artists or filmmakers to start to reflect those questions. And we're one of those bands that have those questions and are asking those questions.

We're not a band that claims to have the answer to any of those questions. I don't know if anybody does. In this sort of current climate of music, we stand out simply because I think there are bands that are avoiding the So, it makes us sort of an anomaly and I think that's where we get the tag 'protest music' or 'political punk rock. I'll be honest with you, I'm hesitant to own that tag because I like protest music. And when I listen to it, I don't think of Rise Against as 'protest music.'

Find more of the interview here.