{"id":41001,"date":"2008-07-08T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2008-07-08T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/reviews\/rise-and-fall-rage-and-grace\/"},"modified":"2008-07-08T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2008-07-08T00:00:00","slug":"rise-and-fall-rage-and-grace","status":"publish","type":"review","link":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/reviews\/rise-and-fall-rage-and-grace\/","title":{"rendered":"Rise And Fall, Rage And Grace"},"content":{"rendered":"

On their new album produced by Bob Rock (Bon Jovi, Metallica), the Offspring have slicked up their presentation and tightened their material. There\u2019s still a goofiness to how the band addresses the world, seen in the way they code the actual refrain in \u201cStuff Is Messed Up\u201d and the manner in which the band borrows riffs in the lead-off single \u201cHammerhead\u201d (and again in the aforementioned \u201cStuff\u201d). It\u2019d be insulting to actually name the riffs they are riffing on, but trust me, you\u2019ll know them both. Neither subtract from the overall sense that the Offspring has delivered (yet another) impressive collection of material. <\/p>\n

It is fitting that the Offspring begins this release with \u201cHalf-Truism.\u201d After a brief, clean guitar intro, vocalist\/guitarist Dexter Holland, bassist Greg K, and guitarist Noodles take over and through the rest of their short punk-ish outbursts, there are very few lulls. No single track, in fact, can be called filler on this recording. Smartly enlisting the services of drum slut Josh Freese, who plays with everyone, \u201cHalf-Truism\u201d includes all the trademark idiosyncrasies for which the Offspring is known. The lyrics are smart, delivered quickly and with conviction. The vocals are layered as they have been layered on previous Offspring releases. The guitar riff is urgent and drives the song. Freese fulfills his role as a hired hand and quiets his rhythms when he needs to and bashes when he needs to as well — dynamics remain his forte as a drummer. <\/p>\n

Holland<\/st1:place><\/st1:city>\u2019s lyrics, as they have always been, are all over the place. In \u201cTrust In You,\u201d he is introspective when he declares, \u201cI\u2019m willing to find what\u2019s really inside \/ and show I am strong enough to \/ trust in you.\u201d In \u201cYou\u2019re Gonna Go Far, Kid,\u201d he is obscene when he sings, \u201cNow dance fucker dance \/ Man, he never had a chance \/ and no one even knew.\u201d Finally, in \u201cKristy, Are You Doing Okay,\u201d he is regretful on lines like \u201cI knew something was wrong \/ and I should have spoke out \/ and I\u2019m so sorry now \/ I didn\u2019t know \/ cause we were so young.\u201d All three of these examples are welcome signs that the Offspring, or at least Holland, for all the similarities between this release and previous releases, understands that they can\u2019t retain their fans and remain relevant by releasing the same songs with different lyrics and slightly different chord progressions — they needed to embrace change and Holland does on this release.<\/p>\n

Unlike previous releases, where there are at least two songs that exemplify this band\u2019s sense of humor, there is only one amusing nugget to be found here. Previous moments like \u201cWhy Don\u2019t You Get a Job?\u201d and \u201cPretty Fly (For A White Guy)\u201d served to separate the Offspring from other bands in the past. Still, Holland<\/st1:place><\/st1:city> gets a chuckle out of me on this release with his \u201cStuff Is Messed Up\u201d rant. Actually, the title on the CD booklet is code for a different phrase and I\u2019ve already used my quota for F-bombs. <\/p>\n

All in all, I was satisfied with this release. I like that the band has been able to stick with their patented formula of creating great hooks and listenable riffs and remain relevant. This is a mid-year candidate for release of the year, but I\u2019m not taking bets until September when Metallica\u2019s Death Magnetic<\/i> is released.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":29424,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[7016],"rating":[5646],"class_list":["post-41001","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-the-offspring","rating-rating-a"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/41001","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41001"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/41001\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29424"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41001"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41001"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=41001"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=41001"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}