Credit: Jason SiegelRise Against released a new song called “Broken Dreams, Inc.” in September, and the band’s been working on more new music to follow their 2017 album, Wolves.
“I’ll tell you this, we’ve been really busy,” frontman Tim McIlrath tells ABC Audio. “We were busy before the pandemic, we’ve stayed as busy as we can after.”
“We’ve not just been sitting around, hanging out on Zoom calls all day,” he jokes. “We’ve been really tapping into something, and we can’t wait to share it when it’s ready, and when the world is ready for it.”
The world, of course, has had a rough year in 2020. Even as he’s seen the music industry constantly change during his career, McIlrath feels nothing has impacted it quite like the COVID-19 pandemic has.
“We put out records before social media, we put out records when Napster was still a thing, and we put out records after it,” McIlrath says. “Every time we did it it was some new thing, but this is definitely an ever newer thing.”
As a band that’s often explored political and social issues, the direction of Rise Against’s new music has naturally been influenced by everything that’s happened in 2020. However, McIlrath feels that the never-ending insanity of this year presents a unique challenge.
“The things we’ve written about have been dystopian, and now it’s trying to make them not too on the nose,” McIlrath says.
McIlrath adds that with artists speaking out through their music more now than ever before, it’s important for Rise Against to continue to do so, as well.
“We’re gonna continue to weigh in, and we have to find a way to do it that’s uniquely Rise Against, where we’re adding to the conversation and not just simply regurgitating the conversation,” he says.
By Josh Johnson
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