Maps of Music

Americana (1998)

Where the lyrics of Americana take you, and where it was really made.

This album's cover illustration was first made by Frank Kozik for a Nebraskan band, Ritual Device, before it was reused here.

Key places

Recorded at Eldorado Recording Studios in Burbank (1998)

Recording site Eldorado Recording Studios — Americana was recorded from July to September 1998 at Eldorado Recording Studios with producer Dave Jerden. The same studio was used for mixing, and the record was mastered elsewhere. Google Maps · Apple Maps

How to get there: See the map for directions.

Album story

Overview

• Americana: fifth studio album by American rock band The Offspring
• Released 17 November 1998 by Columbia Records
• Work began in July 1998 after the worldwide tour for Ixnay on the Hombre (1997)
• Recording sessions lasted about two months
• Second and last Offspring album produced by Dave Jerden
• Debuted at number two on the US Billboard 200, the band's highest chart position
• Sold over 198,000 copies in its first week
• Second best-selling Offspring album after Smash (1994), with over ten million copies sold worldwide
• Singles: Pretty Fly (for a White Guy), Why Don't You Get a Job?, The Kids Aren't Alright, She's Got Issues

Background

• Smash (1994) breakout led to the band signing with Columbia Records in 1996
• Ixnay on the Hombre received simultaneous gold and platinum certifications in the US in April 1997
• The band wrote new material after the Ixnay tour, aiming to avoid a radical departure from its earlier work
• Promoted with a worldwide tour that included an appearance at Woodstock '99

Recording

• Recorded July to September 1998 at Eldorado Recording Studios, Burbank, California
• Dave Jerden produced the album, as he had produced Ixnay on the Hombre
• Pay the Man had been left off Ixnay on the Hombre for sounding too different from the band's other work

Cover

• Artist Frank Kozik was hired for the artwork because the band found his tour posters matched the album's feel
• Kozik demanded $75,000 for the Americana illustrations
• The cover shows a blond boy with an orthopedic boot on a swing holding a sand flea, with a tentacle reaching toward him

Sources: en.wikipedia.org · www.discogs.com

Tracklist

Sources: musicbrainz.org

Artist

Formation

• Formed in Garden Grove, California in 1984 under the name Manic Subsidal; renamed The Offspring in 1986.
• Played a key role in reviving mainstream interest in punk rock during the 1990s.
• Have sold more than 45 million records and are among the best-selling punk bands.

Members

• Dexter Holland (lead vocals, guitar) and Noodles (lead guitar) are the founding core.
• Current lineup also includes Todd Morse (bass), Jonah Nimoy (multi-instrumentalist) and Brandon Pertzborn (drums).
• Greg K. Kriesel, a co-founder, was fired from the band in 2018.

Career

• Released Smash (1994) on Epitaph Records; it sold over 11 million copies and helped push punk into the mainstream.
• Signed with Columbia Records in 1996; Americana (1998) reached number two on the Billboard 200.
• Rise and Fall, Rage and Grace (2008) revived their career, with "You're Gonna Go Far, Kid" topping the Billboard rock charts for eleven weeks.
• Released Let the Bad Times Roll (2021) and Supercharged (2024).

Sources: en.wikipedia.org

Reception

At release

• The album received mixed reviews
• AllMusic (Michael Gallucci): three stars out of five
• Gallucci praised the music as a blend of salsa and alterna-rock sounds
• Gallucci wrote that the band's music was taking a different direction
• Entertainment Weekly (Dan Snierson): called Americana post-punk done right
• Snierson noted the album's crafty yell-odies and winky lyrics

Reappraisal

• The A.V. Club (Stephen Thompson), reviewing the next album Conspiracy of One, called Americana bad enough to create a backlash against pop-punk
• Rock Sound listed the album at number 79 on its 101 Modern Classics list
• Rock Sound listed the album at number 23 on its list of the 51 most essential pop punk albums of all time

Records

• Peaked at number two on the US Billboard 200
• Topped Australia's ARIA Albums Chart for five weeks in 1999
• Certified gold shortly after release, then later platinum
• Ranked 224th best-selling album of all time by Billboard as of 2009
• Named at the 2000 Juno Awards as one of the best-selling albums of that year

Sources: en.wikipedia.org · www.discogs.com · es.wikipedia.org

Trivia

• Pay the Man was left off Ixnay on the Hombre for sounding too different from anything else the band had made at that time
• The main riff of Pay the Man, especially the drum part, matches the title track of Smash in an acoustic version of Come Out and Play
• Pretty Fly (for a White Guy) opens with a sample of Rock of Ages by Def Leppard
• The hidden track Pretty Fly (Reprise) is a mariachi reprise of the single
• The album produced five singles, including Walla Walla

Sources: en.wikipedia.org · www.discogs.com

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