Appeal to Reason

Rise Against always rises most topical issues

A famous punk rock band from Chicago Rise Against formed in 1999 first attracted the audience’s attention mainly due to its second album Revolutions Per Minute and released its most successful album The Sufferer And The Witness two years ago. The band’s line-up has partially changed several times and today includes a vocalist and guitarist Tim McIlrath, bassist Joe Principe, drummer Brandon Barnes and guitarist Zach Blair. The guys succeed in combining a classic punk sound with politically oriented lyrics always rising most topical issues such as war in Iraq and the world situation. Performing relentlessly both as a warm-up act of other bands and independently the band barely finds time for studio work. This is also true about its fifth work Appeal To Reason released this autumn: the guys started working on the album at the beginning of this year and have sung several new songs on his numerous performances in summer already. Continuing the previous work’s attitude Appeal To Reason proves to be another political album from Rise Against pleasing with the musicians’ even more powerful playing and easily pretending to be the year’s best punk album.

A heavier work Appeal To Reason

If The Sufferer And The Witness was a bit less heavy work than the first recordings of Rise Against, then Appeal To Reason does more than just fills the voids of the missing punk elements. Besides one can catch some untypical for punk reggae elements among the rattling drums and persistent guitars cutting the air on Appeal To Reason some tunes getting closer to pop music. In this respect singles Collapse (Post-Amerika) and Re-Education (Through Labor) have proved to be bright examples of how to make a punk hit that would be radio friendly and yet not disappoint the genre fans. Such compositions as not too serious The Dirt Whispered, energetic Kotov Syndrome and sullen The Strength To Go On please with the guitarist and drummer’s splendid work and of course each song is remarkable for the singer’s powerful vocals varying from rough growling to loud shouting. Hero Of War, the only ballad on the album, is a nice deviation from the aggressive vigor of the rest of the songs and here Tim McIlrath’s singing is much more heartfelt which goes well with the lyrics based on the real stories told by soldiers who came back from Iraq. Composition Entertainment surprises with the musicians’ reflecting on their social role while Savior amazes with a most powerful chorus on the record.

One of the best punk rock representatives

Although Rise Against exists for less than a decade there have already been both rises and falls in its creative work and it is obvious that another rise has begun on a previous work which the collective successfully continues on Appeal To Reason. Produced by Bill Stevenson this quality punk rock collection will surely attract even more new fans to the band and persuade the old ones that the Chicagoans are really among of the best representatives of this musical direction. Yet besides playing and recording music these guys are different from the other collectives of the kind for their interests. The thing is that all of the collective’s members without exception are vegetarians and fight actively for animals protection. For instance they have made a video for their single Ready to Fall which reflected their views concerning the environmental situation threatening animals and also mention this in their texts. On the whole everything is not that simple in Rise Against creative work as it might seem at first sight and the album Appeal To Reason once again become the best way to confirm it.