It’s the return of our favorite eyeliner-filled band, Fall Out Boy, with their new album “Save Rock and Roll.” This 11-track album brings together an interesting mix of featuring artists that will initially cause listeners to question the legitimacy of its title. The band has just brought itself back from their five-year hiatus, and it might be a little too late for the ambitiousness of actually saving rock and roll.
The first three songs that grace our ears are without a doubt the album’s finest. The first, titled, “The Phoenix,” is arguably their best song with an orchestra and drum backing up the rally cry that is Patrick Stump’s vocals. It’s easily the fiercest song from the band, an anthem of war with lyrics shouting, “Put on your war paint! The war is won before it’s begun!”
The second track, “My Songs Know What You Did in The Dark (Light Em Up),” is the popular single that brought them back to the charts, and “Alone Together,” track number three, shows just why this band is falling out of their punk persona and more into the pop category. It begins with a simple piano, and the vocals of Stump then lead into the band breaking out for the cliché filled chorus, singing, “let’s be alone together, we could stay young forever.” The lyrics most certainly lack originality, but the band and the unique vocals give it the edge it needs to shine out from the others.
The band includes some unexpected guests for a few tracks throughout the rest of the album. In the track “Rat a Tat,” Courtney Love makes her appearance, opening the song with a sassy “It’s Courtney, bitch.” Courtney? Britney? What’s the difference as long as it sounds just as sexy, which Courtney manages to do in this song. The most surprising guest was Big Sean, rapping out his own verse into the song “The Mighty Fall,” giving Fall Out Boy a power up for those who love the rap genre but possibly losing the fans they might have had for years. So far, it doesn’t look like they have done much to accomplish their album title.
We reach the end with the last song album- titled, “Save Rock and Roll,” featuring Elton John, and here’s where our faith might be returned. The whole song is a cry of their dedication to the genre of rock and roll, giving any listener the urge to put their lighters up in the air to the lyrics singing, “I will defend the faith, going down swinging, I will save the songs, the songs we’re singing.” It’s also heart-warming to hear their familiar lyrics “going down swinging” that no doubt are in an intentional reminder of their successful song in 2007.
Ultimately, rock and roll is a thing of the past, and Fall Out Boy knows it. The band has lost some of their crowd of misfit kids just through the passing of time, but they choose to push their way through it by adapting to the pop culture of cliché lyrics and featured rap artists. It’s a strategy that will work well for them, knowing that their truly dedicated fans will remain and be added with the new ones. In the end, they did not save rock and roll, but they did save themselves.
