LP Bad Religion – New Maps Of Hell

LP Bad Religion – New Maps Of Hell

”New Maps of Hell” is Bad Religion’s fourteenth full-length studio album (twentieth release overall), which was released on July 10, 2007. It celebrates the 25th anniversary of their first album ”How Could Hell Be Any Worse?”, although the band had been around for twenty-eight years.

The title is something of a departure for the band, in the sense that most Bad Religion albums have an eponymous title track, except ”How Could Hell Be Any Worse?”, ”Into the Unknown”, and ”The Process of Belief”. The title may refer to a book on Science Fiction history by Kingsley Amis published in 1961 (see ). Guitarist Brett Gurewitz stated “We all liked the concept of maps, because we are exploring new material on this record, both musically and topically.”

Bad Religion’s follow-up to 2004’s ”The Empire Strikes First” was originally rumored to be a double album to be released in 2006, but this was denied by bassist Jay Bentley. Due to the band’s ongoing support with their previous release, the album was put on hold until 2007. Another one of the reasons why the band had yet to release a follow-up to ”The Empire Strikes First” was their various other activities, most obviously frontman Greg Graffin’s, who released his second solo album in 2006, following his first since 1997.

”New Maps of Hell” also marks the third Bad Religion album released after returning to Epitaph Records for 2002’s ”The Process of Belief” and with Gurewitz since his departure during the release of 1994’s ”Stranger Than Fiction. – Wikipedia