Fall Out Boy's Folie A Deux

“Honestly, we have never been a critically- acclaimed band or ‘cool’ band, but we have always moved the needle because of our fans and we don’t want that to change.” Fall Out Boy (FOB) bassist/lyricist Pete Wentz wrote that blog entry a few weeks before finishing Folie A Deux, the band’s fourth full-length album. Although the group has grown exponentially in its seven-year existence — from an opening band at VFW Halls to headlining arenas and topping the music charts — there’s a consistency to the group that can’t be measured simply by record or ticket sales.

Folie may not initially sound like the same band that was berthed in the Chicago punk/hard core scene, but it inhabits the same spirit. It’s adventurous, vibrant and, catchy — all characteristics that the band and its fan base have come to expect over the last decade.

Folie A Deux feels both like result of seven years of hard work and something that could only be produced right now. It’s both cynical and hopeful, lyrically and musically challenging, personal and political, and easily the most diverse record FOB has ever recorded. This is what “Folie” isn’t: A “grown-up” record (Read: boring, middle-of-the-road); if anything, the album — whose title translates as “a madness shared by two” — is the most hard-hitting album in the band’s career.