The Black Market is the seventh studio album by American melodic hardcore band Rise Against, released on July 15, 2014. With the same line-up as their previous two albums, guitarist Zach Blair has become Rise Against's first guitarist to appear on three studio albums. It is the last Rise Against album to be released through Interscope Records.
The Black Market debuted at number three on the US Billboard 200, becoming the band's third consecutive top five album.
Release
On April 14, 2014, the band posted a short video on their Facebook page teasing a new album with the message "Coming Soon." On May 5, 2014, the band posted another short video indicating that a new album would be released in the summer of 2014. On May 27, 2014, the band released a short video with a teaser of a song from the new album, and clarified the summer release date to be July 2014. On June 4, 2014, a new teaser was released on Facebook revealing the album title The Black Market and release date of July 15, 2014.
The album's first single, "I Don't Want to Be Here Anymore", was released to radio on June 10, 2014. On June 13, 2014, the band released the artwork for the upcoming album. This was released on all the major social networking sites. On July 8, 2014, the band released the entire album for pre-release streaming via iTunes. "Tragedy + Time" impacted radio on October 21, 2014.
Critical reception
The Black Market received mostly positive reviews. It attained a score of 76 out of 100 on Metacritic's average of seven professional reviews. Matt Sloan of CultNoise Magazine scored the album 8.5/10, saying that 'some might consider the social commentary present in The Black Market to be, on the surface, too general and unfocused to be saying anything that hasn’t been said before. However, this is to do the band a disservice; The Black Market is an album about the weariness that comes from living in this world, in having to fight to survive.' MusicReviewRadar wrote that The Black Market "may not be as intense and enraged as their antecessors but, once you listen to it, you will find the political fight Rise Against always print on their albums". The album was included at number 33 on Rock Sound's "Top 50 Albums of the Year" list. The album was included at number 6 on Kerrang!'s "The Top 50 Rock Albums Of 2014" list.
Commercial performance
The Black Market is Rise Against's third highest charting album on the US Billboard 200, debuting at no. 3 and selling 53,000 copies in its first week.
In Canada, the album debuted at number one on the Canadian Albums Chart, selling 14,000 copies in its first week.
The album became Rise Against's highest position in the UK thus far after it debuted at number 13. Their previous peak was number 27 with 2011's Endgame.
Track listing
All lyrics written by Tim McIlrath; all music composed by Tim McIlrath, Joe Principe, Brandon Barnes and Zach Blair.
Personnel
Charts
Certifications
Release history
References
Citations
Sources
External links
- The Black Market at YouTube (streamed copy where licensed)