Fall Out Boy have reflected on the 20th anniversary of their debut album ‘Take This To Your Grave’, describing it as “lightning strike accident of a record that absolutely changed my life”.
The US pop-punk band — Pete Wentz, Andy Hurley, Patrick Stump and Joseph Trohman — released their studio debut on May 6, 2003, two years after they formed in the Chicago suburbs.
“About 21 or so years ago, as I was applying to colleges I would ultimately never go to, Fall Out Boy began as a little pop punk side project of what we assumed was Pete’s more serious band Arma Angelus,” Stump posted to the band’s social media this week.
“We were sloppy and we couldn’t solidify a lineup, but the three of us (Pete, Joe, and I) were having way too much fun to give up on it.”
He explained that they were “really rough around the edges”, adding: “As an example of how rough, one of my favorite teachers pulled me aside after hearing the recording that would become “Evening Out With Your Girlfriend,” and tactfully said “What do you think your best instrument is Patrick? Drums. It’s drums. Probably not singing Patrick.”
“We went into Smart Studios with the Sean O’Keefe…. So there we were, 3/5 of a band with a singer who’d only been singing a year, no drummer, and one out of two guitarists. But we had the opportunity to record with Sean and record at Butch Vig’s legendary studio.”
He went on that eight or so months later, record label Fueled By Ramen gave them a contract to record the remaining songs. “We’d sleep on floors, eat nothing but peanut butter and jelly, live in a van for the next 3 years, and somehow in spite of that eventually play with Elton John and Taylor Swift and Jay-Z and for President Obama and for the NFC championship, and all these other wildly unpredictable and unlikely things.
“But none of that would ever come close to happening if Andy hadn’t made it to the session and Joe hadn’t dragged us kicking and screaming into being a band.”
They concluded: “Happy 20th birthday Take This To Your Grave, you weird brilliant lightning strike accident of a record that absolutely changed my life.”
Happy 20th birthday Take This To Your Grave pic.twitter.com/uQdI0x4F8U
— Fall Out Boy (@falloutboy) May 8, 2023
Fall Out Boy recently reflected on their debut record with NME, with Wentz sharing that he was “just so happy we made it out as the same four guys. I’m most proud we exist 20 years in and we’re talking about music we made this year. That’s pretty cool”.
The band’s eighth album ‘So Much (For) Stardust’ came out in March this year, described by NME as an “audacious return from theatrical rockers”.
It continued that the album “brings all the early ’00s nostalgia without the gimmicks”, adding: “It also doesn’t take itself too seriously: see the spoken word intro of “an alligator prince with crocodile tears” of ‘Baby Annihilation’. A rock titan set with the task of advancing their sound in a way that can still appease the sensibilities of lifelong fans could be daunting, but Fall Out Boy pull it off.”
In January this year, Fall Out Boy guitarist Trohman announced that he is currently “stepping away” from the band to focus on his mental health.
Meanwhile, the band recently launched a new vinyl version of ‘So Much (For) Stardust’ today containing real human tears.