Image Courtesy of Crush ManagementIn 2013, Fall Out Boy returned after a three-year hiatus to find a very different musical landscape then the one they'd left. So different, in fact, that frontman Patrick Stump was convinced the band would never score another hit.
"We thought that was the end of radio for us," Stump tells Rolling Stone of that time. "We thought we would go out, play some shows and, you know, whatever." That turned out not to be the case, however, as FOB hit it big once again with "My Songs Know What You Did in the Dark (Light Em Up)," from their 2013 comeback album, Save Rock and Roll.
"This is a disco era, so to hear our songs on the radio is kinda surprising," says Stump.
FOB didn't wait long to complete their second post-hiatus album, American Beauty/American Psycho. The new record, featuring the hit single "Centuries," will be released on January 20.
"We asked ourselves, 'What would we want if the Smiths or someone like that reunited?' " says bassist and lyricist Pete Wentz, talking about the quick turnaround between records. "We'd want a new album, new song, a tour right away and don't just go play state fairs."
As for FOB's place on today's charts, Stump says that, while they are first and foremost a rock band, they don't look down their nose at the pop and dance acts that surround them.
"We aren't the last rock band," he says. "But we're the last rock band that doesn't think that pop is a four-letter word."
"My mission statement has always been, 'I want to be the biggest.' Patrick's has always been, 'I want to be the best,'" says Wentz. "At some point, we realized they were two different versions of the same thing."
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