Rise Against

Rise Against came out of Chicago in 1999 playing punk rock at a sprint: fast tempos, hooks as sharp as barbed wire, and a singer, Tim McIlrath, who shouts like he means every word. Joe Principe played bass, Brandon Barnes came in on drums, and Zach Blair later took over lead guitar. Lyrically they write about the world as much as the heart: politics, animal rights, human rights and the environment. Most of the band are straight edge and vegan, and they've backed Amnesty International and the It Gets Better Project.

They spent their first years on the indie label Fat Wreck Chords, where The Unraveling in 2001 and Revolutions per Minute in 2003 earned them an underground following. A deal with DreamWorks, later swallowed by Geffen, came in 2003, and Siren Song of the Counter Culture, in 2004, carried them into the mainstream with the barnstorming "Give It All" and the gentle, wistful "Swing Life Away", proof that the hardcore kids could also sway.

The Sufferer & The Witness, in 2006, climbed into the top ten of the Billboard 200 and became their first album to chart outside North America. "Prayer of the Refugee" and "Ready to Fall" hit like a brick through a window, and "The Good Left Undone" gives the record its biggest, most anthemic chorus.

Appeal to Reason, in 2008, polished up the production and pointed the band straight at the radio. "Savior" went on to break the record for consecutive weeks on both the Hot Rock Songs and Alternative Songs charts, and "Re-Education (Through Labor)" and "Audience Of One" rode the same wave. Endgame, in 2011, reached number 2 on the Billboard 200 with "Help Is On The Way" and "Satellite", and The Black Market in 2014 and Wolves in 2017 both went top ten. Nowhere Generation, in 2021, fell short of that mark, but the band carried on, releasing Ricochet on August 15, 2025.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.