The melodic punk band Rise Against released their song “Prayer of the Refugee” 20 years ago, delving into the struggles of immigrants and consumerism, and dozens more of their songs over their 27-year career still feel especially relevant nowadays.
“There are so many, even ‘Awake Too Long’ or the song ‘Collapse (Post-Amerika),’” bassist Joe Principe said. “It really is crazy. It’s like we were writing almost for this day and age. We always come at it with a sense of hope though. You don’t want to wallow too much in despair in your art, at least we don’t.
“Because we grew up listening to bands that always gave us a sense of hope, and the purpose of being in a band like ours, or just the hardcore punk scene, is you’re screaming, literally. The band Uniform Choice had the song ‘Screaming for Change,’ and that’s literally what we’re doing. Sometimes you have to be extra loud to be heard. And luckily, we’ve been able to build a fan base that keeps growing and growing, that it’s resonating with them, and that’s reassuring. That means people are paying attention.”
Rise Against brings those urgent punk songs, and more, on their spring tour, with a stop Friday at Stage AE in Pittsburgh with Destroy Boys and Koyo opening. Their tour began last Tuesday in Providence, Rhode Island.
“It was great. We haven’t headlined a proper tour in a long time,” Principe said. “We toured with Papa Roach all last year, so it feels good to bring a show that’s our own and play more songs. It was a great way to kick off the tour.”
In a phone call Thursday from Montreal, Principe spoke with TribLive about revisiting old songs, staying hopeful, the band’s latest album “Ricochet” and more. Find a transcript of the conversation, edited for clarity and length, below.
You’ll be in Pittsburgh this Friday, so do you have any memories of the city?
The only thing I can remember is we used to play a club there — and the name’s slipping my mind — but I remember the load-in was up these crazy flight of stairs. (laughs) I just remember dreading the load-in every time, that was when you’re loading our own gear, touring in the van. That comes to mind when I think of Pittsburgh.
Club Laga would have been back in your early days. There were a lot of stairs and a lot of fire hazards…
That sounds familiar, for sure. Yeah, it’s funny the things you remember. When you’re in a band, you always remember things like that or clubs where there’s a pole in the middle of the stage, like a structural pole, just random things. We’ve always had really great shows in Pittsburgh. I do remember we used to tour with scooters, like Vespas. We were all kind of scooting around and we went up this hill into this industrial area and our guitar player Zach (Blair), he was on a scooter that kept breaking down, and he broke down and someone from a warehouse, or they were working, they came out and they literally asked them, they’re like, hey, how much is that scooter worth? Zach was like, uhhh, and then the guy was literally walking toward him to steal it. So then luckily, his scooter started and we went down the hill but I was like, holy (crap). (laughs)
The band made two live debuts with “Awake Too Long” and “A Gentleman’s Coup” in the first show. How did it feel to pull out those songs that are more than 10 years old for the first time?
It’s super fun. As a band that’s been around for so long, it’s great to play songs, to have firsts, to have these milestones, but also it’s harder, right? Because it’s not muscle memory, like we’ve been playing “Ready to Fall” almost every show or “Prayer of the Refugee” every show for years and years. So it’s muscle memory. But playing those songs, you’re like, how does this go again? You definitely tend to overthink everything, but we have moments like that. We’re kind of splitting up the setlist. We have three different setlists on this tour. So if you see one show and you go to another show, chances are you’ll see a different set. We have moments like that in every set, songs we haven’t played or songs that we have rarely played. It keeps it interesting. It keeps us on our toes. But it’s definitely something that we had to do our homework to relearn the songs.
I imagine it’s got to be different. It’s not even like it’s off the latest album; these are definitely some older ones.
Yeah, and it’s also songs where there’s no reason why we never played them. “Awake Too Long” was probably one of my favorite songs off of “The Black Market,” and there’s so many records out and there’s so many song choices that we just kind of overlooked it. But it’s definitely, like “A Gentlemen’s Coup,” it was fun to bring it to Providence, and I imagine they would just get tighter as the tour moves on.
You mentioned “Prayer of the Refugee,” and that’s a 20-year-old song. But does it feel like that song is even more relevant nowadays?
Oh my god, yeah. You know, I wish it wasn’t relevant. I wish songs like “State of the Union” weren’t relevant, and they are more than ever, and it’s disheartening. But at the end of the day, you have to have hope. I think whatever’s happening now, as horrific as it is in the country, I think it’s a temporary evil. I think that moving forward, this administration will come and go, and we’ll have a big mess to clean up globally. The lives lost all around is tragic. Unfortunately, those people, they can’t come back. They lost their lives. But I hope we can all learn from that and move forward and just be better people.
Related
• The Fell bassist Billy Sheehan on bringing the long-awaited band to life
• ‘We accidentally wrote a dark album again’: ERRA vocalist J.T. Cavey on band’s new release ahead of Pittsburgh show
• 2026 Pittsburgh area concert calendar
You mentioned being hopeful, so with all the negativity in the world, is it hard to be hopeful? How do you do that?
It’s something that I personally struggle with because, like everyone, you open up Instagram, you’re scrolling, and it’s all politics and currently, it’s just bad. It’s really sad. I have three kids, three teenagers at this point, so what gives me hope is I see them, I see what they’re learning in school, and they’re gonna grow up to use their voice with voting. They know it’s important to vote. They know it’s important to just use your voice and don’t keep quiet, don’t feel like it’s bad to speak up. That’s encouraging because I see them and I see their friends that come over to the house, I hear them talking — they don’t know that I’m listening — but I can hear them talking. (laughs) And to me, they’re on the right path. They want good in the world, and that’s encouraging to me. So that gives me hope that the future won’t implode. But yeah, it is hard, I struggle with it daily.
Do you feel like today’s political climate fuels the band even more then?
Yeah, I do. And again, to be able to be an outlet for somebody’s frustrations, and whether they’re depressed, frustrated, all the above, anxious, for them to come to Rise Against or whatever other band they find solace in, is great. It definitely gives us a sense of purpose, other than the fact that we absolutely love playing music, but to have a message behind that that resonates with people that’s helping them, it really is the best feeling. We’re very fortunate to have that and to make a difference in people’s everyday lives, because that’s what bands like Bad Religion did for me growing up or even like The Descendents. It’s not just political, it’s all about your everyday life. You’re encountering relationships that may have gone sour, friendships, everything. I relied on bands like The Descendents to get me through all those times. And now I see that with our fans, and that’s really just the best feeling.
Punk music has a history of speaking out, so it doesn’t sound like you’re going to be playing “Rock and Roll All Nite” by Kiss. It’s a big difference.
Yeah, 100%. And it’s kind of like, OK, there’s a time and a place for songs like that, and actually the first band I ever got into as a really little kid was Kiss, because they were very theatrical. I thought the makeup was cool and Gene Simmons looked cool. But you realize, I don’t want just that in my life. I want something that’s gonna help me through all of the times. So there’s a time and a place for kind of lighthearted stuff. But yeah, I definitely need all of it in my life. (laughs)
With the band’s latest album “Ricochet,” what do you think the band changed with its approach this time around?
First and foremost, we definitely just changed up our production team, different producer. We purposely used a producer that wasn’t super familiar with us. It was suggested by our record label, the team over there. We were like, OK, we’ll give it a shot. I think after being a band for 25 years, we kind of owe that to ourselves to explore a little bit. I feel like with every change, with every decision, what I want to do is I want to learn from it, whether it’s a positive or a negative, and you take that information and you move forward. I think every record is like a stamp in time, so that’s what “Ricochet” is for me. We made conscious decisions to change up producers and mixers, and that was huge, too. I think that it encapsulated that time, that part of our career. That’s every record, and again, moving forward, we learned from that. I’m not sure what the next record will end up being. All I know is we had a great experience. It was a little bit of a fish-out-of-water feeling, where you’re used to something for years and years, and then somebody takes you out of your comfort zone. So it’s a little unsettling at times, but again, I think we all took something positive from that experience.