New Maps of Hell (Bad Religion album)

New Maps of Hell
Studio album by Bad Religion
Released	July 10, 2007 (2007-07-10)
Recorded	February -April 2007 at Grandmaster Records, Ltd. in Hollywood
Genre	Punk rock, melodic hardcore
Length	38:40
Label	Epitaph
Producer	Joe Barresi
Bad Religion chronology
The Empire Strikes First (2004) New Maps of Hell (2007) 30 Years Live (2010)
Singles from New Maps of Hell
"Honest Goodbye" Released: 2007 "New Dark Ages" Released: 2007

New Maps of Hell is Bad Religion's fourteenth full-length studio album (twentieth release overall), which was released on July 10, 2007. It celebrates the 25th anniversary of their first album How Could Hell Be Any Worse?, although the band had been around for twenty-eight years.

The title is something of a departure for the band, in the sense that most Bad Religion albums have an eponymous title track, except How Could Hell Be Any Worse?, Into the Unknown, The Process of Belief and The Dissent of Man. The title may refer to a book on Science Fiction history by Kingsley Amis published in 1961 (see here ^[1]). Guitarist Brett Gurewitz stated "We all liked the concept of maps, because we are exploring new material on this record, both musically and topically."^[2]

Bad Religion's follow-up to 2004's The Empire Strikes First was originally rumored to be a double album to be released in 2006, but this was denied by bassist Jay Bentley. Due to the band's ongoing support with their previous release, the album was put on hold until 2007. Another one of the reasons why the band had yet to release a follow-up to The Empire Strikes First was their various other activities, most obviously frontman Greg Graffin's, who released his second solo album in 2006, following his first since 1997.

New Maps of Hell also marks the third Bad Religion album released after returning to Epitaph Records for 2002's The Process of Belief and with Gurewitz since his departure during the release of 1994's Stranger Than Fiction.

Release history

Bad Religion first mentioned the follow-up to The Empire Strikes First in 2005, stating that the band would begin recording it later that year, making it likely that it would be released sometime in 2006.^[3] In July 2005, it was announced that Graffin and Gurewitz had begun writing "about 20 songs or more" for the album.^[4]

On January 20, 2006, it was announced that Bad Religion was "almost 100% ready to go back to the studio or to the house" to begin working on the album.^[5] Members of the band had mentioned that it would be a double release,^[6] but this idea was later turned down flat by Bentley.^[7]

In early February 2006, Bentley was chatting with a visitor who comments on news articles at the official Bad Religion fansite, stating that the new Bad Religion album was planned for a September release, as well as a tour to follow.^[8] In May 2006, he also mentioned that the band was planning to begin recording it around late June/early July.^[9]

Bentley also told Kristoffer Averheim, the webmaster of the Bad Religion fansite, that the album had been pushed back to late 2006/early 2007.^[10] While drummer Brooks Wackerman posted a message on MySpace stating that the band had continued working on a new album, he stated that the album was once again pushed back to "mid/late 2007". On September 11, 2006, Wackerman posted an update on the MySpace bulletin board, stating that the band had begun demoing the songs for the album. He had this to say:

Professional ratings
Aggregate scores
Source	Rating
Metacritic	69/100 link
Review scores
Source	Rating
Allmusic	[11]
The A.V. Club	B [12]
IGN	(8.7/10)[13]
Kerrang!
PopMatters	[14]
Punknews.org	[15]

In January 2007, it was announced that the album would be called New Maps of Hell and the band started working with producer Joe Barresi to finish it.^[16] On April 1, 2007, Bentley posted an update on the MySpace bulletin board, stating that the band was finally finished recording the album and would soon begin mixing it.^[17] He had this to say:

The song "Heroes and Martyrs" was introduced to the public on April 6 at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium during an encore as a small preview of "New Maps of Hell". At least two recordings of this song can be found on the Internet.

On April 19, 2007, "Honest Goodbye" was played on KROQ at 3:40PM. Verified on KROQ's website, where they said that was "Jed's Catch of the Day" for today. A rip of the track circulated online, and was released as a digital single on June 12, 2007.^[18] The song is currently available for listening on Bad Religion's MySpace page.

On April 25, 2007, the track listing was rearranged and the track "New Chapter" was dropped.^[19] When asked why "New Chapter" would not appear on the album, Bentley recently stated that it "ran into insurmountable issues" that the band "couldn't rectify", hinting that it will probably appear on the next Bad Religion album.^[20]

Following the album's release, it debuted at number 35 on the U.S. Billboard 200, selling about 21,000 copies in its first week.^[21]

A video for "New Dark Ages" can be viewed on Bad Religion's myspace. The video for "Honest Goodbye" was planned, but "never made it out of the office" according to Bentley.

On February 27, 2008, Punknews.org reported that Epitaph will be releasing a deluxe edition of New Maps of Hell on July 8.^[22] On May 9, 2008, Punknews.org released the artwork for the reissue and more details, including the track list and the bonus DVD.^[23]

Track listing

Deluxe Edition

On July 7 (or 8th depending on where you live) 2008, a deluxe edition of New Maps of Hell was released. It has two double-sided posters. One poster has a Crossbuster with the words "BAD RELIGION" above it and on the other side it has the band standing at Sunset Boulevard. The other poster has on one side Bad Religion performing from back in the early 80's with a few autographs on it and on the other side it has the cover of 80-85. It comes with a DVD with features an hour of a live performance, music videos for New Dark Ages and Honest Goodbye, a showing of Bad Religion making New Maps of Hell and Graffin and Gurewitz recording the acoustic bonus tracks. It also has seven bonus tracks which are performed acoustically.

Notes/Trivia

• Track 4, "New Dark Ages" is featured as a downloadable song for the Rock Band series of video games, along with "No Control" (from the band's 1989 album with the same title).^[24] Due to age-appropriate content restrictions, "New Dark Ages" is not playable in Lego Rock Band, unlike "No Control".

Personnel

• Greg Graffin - vocals, piano
• Brett Gurewitz - guitar, backing vocals
• Brian Baker - guitar
• Greg Hetson - guitar
• Jay Bentley - bass, backing vocals
• Brooks Wackerman - drums

• Joe Barresi - producer
• Mike Fasano - drum technician
• Andrew Alekel - assistant engineer
• Nick Pritchard - art direction, design
• Bryan Sheffield - photography

References

External links

• New Maps of Hell at YouTube (streamed copy where licensed)