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Rise Against: ‘The World Has No Shortage Of Fuel For A Band That Likes To Sing About Injustice’

13 August 2025 | 11:41 am | Mary Varvaris

Rise Against vocalist Tim McIlrath reveals how “our collective inter-connectedness” and increasingly divisive world events inspired the enduring punk band’s tenth album, Ricochet.

Rise Against

Rise Against (Credit: Mynxii White)

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Rise Against are in Gothenburg, a major city in Sweden, and singer Tim McIlrath is thinking about a little hardcore punk band called Refused, who formed approximately eleven-and-a-half hours away in Umeå, Northeast Sweden.

“They’re such an incredible band,” McIlrath muses. “It’s funny because I’m here in Sweden right now, I’m in Gothenburg, so I’ve been thinking about Refused a lot, and the area they grew up in. I saw them in, like, 1996 at a bowling alley in Chicago opening up for Snapcase, and that was my first time seeing them.

He adds, “Everything from their politics to everything they did was so alive and full of energy and pulled from a lot of the same influences, and we’ve toured them as well. We actually took The (International) Noise Conspiracy across Australia, like 15 years ago, and then we’ve taken Refused across Europe before, too. So that was a cool, full-circle moment.”

It's fitting yet unfortunate that Rise Against and Refused continue to exist, shouting truth to power with raucous punk rock tunes. The Music catches up with the Rise Against frontman ahead of the release of their upcoming album, Ricochet, out this Friday, 15 August, via Loma Vista Recordings.

Since their formation in 1999, the Chicago-founded punk rock band have consistently emphasised strong melody and catchy hooks, rapid tempos and addictive riffs while McIlrath—possessing one of the most recognisable voices in rock—sings, screams, and spits about politics, animal rights, humanitarianism, and environmentalism.

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With their major label debut, 2004’s Siren Song Of The Counter Culture, Rise Against found mainstream success that rapidly expanded following the release of follow-up LPs The Sufferer & The Witness (2006) and 2008’s Appeal To Reason. Endgame arrived in 2011, followed by 2014’s The Black Market and 2017’s Wolves. Ricochet comes after the underrated Nowhere Generation, released in 2021.

Rise Against returned to Australia last February, opening for blink-182 in arenas across the country. Their last headline tour took place in 2018, along with Download Festival dates.

Reflecting on the blink-182 tour, McIlrath tells, “We’ve had the honour of being in Australia with some cool bands – we’ve done the Big Day Out tour multiple times. We toured Australia with the Foo Fighters, and coming back with blink was definitely a personal career highlight.

“I love seeing this band, what they are now and what they mean to people in their fourth decade of relevance, how they’ve doubled down, the arc of their career, and their ups and downs,” he adds. “And then I loved the three of them, you know what I mean? Backstage, the vibe was so cool. They were so nice and accommodating. They were hilarious.”

That tour led to the realisation that, despite different career paths, Rise Against and blink-182 emerged from the same world: “We’re all just t-shirt and jeans bands who grew up listening to punk rock,” McIlrath admits.

“And for them, it’s gotten gigantic, you know? It was inspiring for a band like us to see a band like them and what they’re still doing, showing you it’s possible to be a punk band in that stage of your career and be pulling in bigger crowds than you’ve ever pulled in, and still be friends; they’re still having a good time. I loved them; I loved their crew. The Australian crowds were incredible. While we were playing, it felt like a Rise Against show, you know what I mean?”

And Rise Against are planning another trek Down Under. McIlrath cheekily offers, “We are currently conspiring to get down and bring the show to Australia. This is a place that has supported us for so long, so we are definitely coming back.”

Ricochet is built to be part of the solution in an increasingly divided world. As McIlrath commented about the album in May, the concept focuses on “our collective inter-connectedness.”

He explained at the time, “Everything you do is going to affect somebody; everything you throw will affect the next person. We’re connected to other countries, other economies; we’re connected to undocumented immigrants. We’re connected to every decision our leaders make. It’s all one big ricochet effect. That idea is the backbone of this album.”

As for finding a way to continue fighting for a better future, McIlrath hopes that fans latch onto the new album’s concept and remember to protect one another.

“I hope that the concept behind Ricochet, that we are all in the same room, we’re all in this together, everything you do, everything I do, bounces off rooms,” he tells The Music. “We’re all subject to it, whether that’s good energy or bad energy, or whatever it is.

“You’re in Australia. I’m from Chicago. I’m here in Sweden. We’re all in this together, whatever language we speak, whatever flag we fly under, whatever side of what border we’re on. The rights of an undocumented immigrant in America today are connected to my rights as well, and they’re connected to all of our rights.

“We aren’t as isolated as I think we believe, and we exist in so many spaces together, and we have to look out for each other, and we have to protect each other. And so, I think that today, now more than ever, it’s so important to see how connected we are, and we only benefit from those connections and staying connected.”

While Ricochet is undoubtedly another politically charged album from Rise Against, there are still other themes at play. Sink Like A Stone explores mental health, while Black Crown anticipates the apocalypse. The songs are as exciting as ever, too. The title track is perhaps one of the most unique songs in the band’s catalogue; an acoustic ballad that develops into something remarkable.

For said title track, McIlrath was collaborating with songwriter and producer Jenn Decilveo and recalls Ricochet being an “underthought thing.”

“I was riffing on something, and she was really encouraging. And next thing, 30 minutes later, we had this song,” he remembers. “It was a great lesson for me personally, just not to overthink some of the stuff, and just let it out, you know? I think that sort of energy came together on that song.

“I think it’s a departure for Rise Against, too, because we were hoping to make a record that people would hear and be like, ‘Wait, this is Rise Against?’ I feel like, with Nowhere Generation, I love that album—it’s very traditional Rise Against; you hear it, and you’re like, ‘Yeah, this is Rise Against’—But I want people to have a question mark at the end of that sentence. I feel good about that, because I think that’s what’s going to happen.”

With Ricochet, Rise Against also deepened their ties with Australia by securing Melbourne-born producer Catherine Marks for their rawest outing yet. Marks, known for bringing the best out of artists’ sound, including boygenius, Manchester Orchestra, Foals, The Killers, and many others, was about capturing the energy of the room on record.

“She’s so amazing. I just saw her two weeks ago in London because she’s Australian-born, London-based,” McIlrath shares. “People might know her from records like boygenius or Manchester Orchestra or Frank Turner or Frank Carter—both my favourite Franks! [laughs]. She is a force of nature; she is like a light in the room.

“There’s nobody more passionate about their work than Catherine Marks. She doesn't sleep or eat. She just thinks music and works on music and cares about the songs, you know? It was a blast, just being around that kind of energy. It was an absolute joy to be around her; she’s an inspiring person.”

Comparing the experience of working with Marks to past works, McIlrath notes, “In the past, if we had any faults, it’s that we took our music and put it under the microscope so much that we risked sterilising it.

“And she was more about this raw energy of the room, what it felt like right then, and just capturing that energy right there, which was something that was kind of uncomfortable for us at first, because we were just like, ‘No, it can’t be raw and live. It’s got to be perfect and airtight.’ And she was more about capturing the feeling than the technicality of it all.

“In the end, we created something that doesn’t sound like other Rise Against records, which I think was the mission. It gets harder to do as you become a band that’s going into its third decade!” But for Rise Against, there’s still plenty to write about in 2025.

Ricochet, like the nine albums before it, is being released during a pivotal time: a balm for living in a turbulent, uncertain period.

“Well, the world has no shortage of fuel for a band that likes to sing about injustice,” McIlrath admits with a chuckle. “There’s a lot of low-hanging fruit out there, for sure, and that can be a frustrating endeavour over 25 years. As you sing about change and you advocate for change, you see that change comes, and sometimes you see it go.”

Ricochet arrives as ICE pick up undocumented, hardworking immigrants in cities such as Los Angeles. It comes as the United States’ Supreme Court considers overturning its landmark ruling, allowing same-sex couples to marry. It comes as freedom of speech is being curtailed throughout the West—a topic referenced in the title track’s music video.

It comes as the UK introduced the Online Safety Act, and people are already forced to verify their age just to use Spotify. It comes as Australia aims to lock under-16s out of social media—including YouTube—from December, effectively cutting them off from today’s largest well of knowledge (and music videos).

“Sometimes you see progress, and sometimes you see us take two steps back,” McIlrath says. “So, all those things are part of this journey. But at the end of the day, it’s that people listen. I mean, there’s an appetite for what we do—that is such a validating thing.”

He continues, “When you first start a band, you throw these songs into the ether, and you’re not sure if they are cringy and you should be embarrassed, or if there might be an audience for them, you know what I mean? That’s just the nature of doing anything.

“When we found passionate fans that identified with what we were doing, we were like, ‘Oh, there are people out there who feel like us.’ And so, every time I hear from a fan saying, ‘Oh, your music makes me feel less alone in the way I look at the world,’ that’s the same thing for us.

“The fact that that person is at our show and has got a ticket or bought a record or listened to us makes us feel less like freaks, too. Like, you also share this perspective, or we were able to put something you were feeling into a song.

“That’s what a band should do. Those fans, like people tonight in Gothenburg, and certainly our Australian fans that have been coming to our shows for 20-plus years… When you’re so far away from home and yet you find somebody who connects with what you’re doing, that never gets old.”

Ricochet is out this Friday, 15 August, via Loma Vista Recordings. You can pre-order a copy of the album here.