Popular Monster - 2024 European Epitaph label 11-track LP

FALLING IN REVERSE return with 2024’s Popular Monster, the postmodern trailblazer’s first full-length in seven years. The album arrives armed with no less than three RIAA-certified gold singles (“ZOMBIFIED,” “Voices in My Head,” “Watch the World Burn”), the double-platinum title track, a reimagined nü-metal classic, and six brand new anthems of furious metal, melody, and hip-hop. 

Popular Monster is a defiant statement and triumphant victory for singer, songwriter, bandleader, and provocateur Ronnie Radke, who invented Falling In Reverse inside a prison cell. 

Radke fills the fifth full-length from Falling In Reverse with invincible and irresistible songs that resonate across generations and genres. Co-produced with longtime collaborator Tyler Smyth (I Prevail, Skillet, Lights), Popular Monster is full of confessional angst, bravado, and clever wordplay. 

Ronnie formed a series of pop-punk bands in Las Vegas as a teenager, culminating in the creation of Escape The Fate. The metalcore group’s meteoric rise coincided with the singer’s spiral into addiction. By the time he was sentenced to two years in prison, the band he started had moved on without him. Some fans, critics, and industry types figured his story would end there. 

They were very wrong. 

The gold-certified debut album from Falling In Reverse, The Drug In Me Is You (2011), arrived less than two years after Ronnie’s release. Thanks to his formative fascinations with metal, punk, and hip-hop, he almost single-handedly revived rap rock with the ambitious Fashionably Late (2013).
Just Like You (2015), debuted in the Top 5 on the US Rock chart. The grungy and atmospheric Coming Home (2017) demonstrated yet another adventurous side of Radke’s self-expression. 

“Losing My Mind” and “Losing My Life” surprised the so-called “scene” all over again in 2018 when he became the first of his peers to swerve from the album format to standalone singles. “Drugs” explored the American substance abuse epidemic and channeled Ronnie’s own heartbreak.

The massive “Popular Monster” became Ronnie’s first No. 1 song on the radio and his first platinum single less than two years after its release. It was also the first No. 1 song on Billboard’s inaugural Hot Hard Rock Songs chart, which considers airplay, streaming, and downloads. “Popular Monster” eventually went double-platinum in the US and 3x platinum in Australia. “ZOMBIFIED” and “Voices In My Head” went to No. 1 back-to-back. “Voices In My Head” was also the No. 1 Song of 2022 at SiriusXM’s Octane. The unconventional, caustic, and super heavy “Watch the World Burn” dominated rock radio in 2023 and improbably became his first Billboard Hot 100 song. 

As with the top-notch producers and directors Ronnie has hired to help execute his vision, he’s regularly surrounded himself with incredible live players, resulting in unforgettable performances with various lineups over the years. Radke owns the stage, whether taking the Warped Tour mantle held by My Chemical Romance, Avenged Sevenfold, and Fall Out Boy in the tour’s final years, performing in prominent spots on every major rock festival, or on massive headlining treks.  

Popular Monster, the album, marks another chapter in the ongoing story of an artist who continually beats the odds, surmounting obstacles (and adversaries) both within and without. 

“Radke stands as one of this generation’s most revered rock frontmen,” wrote the esteemed Forbes Magazine in a 2020 profile. “And maybe even one of the scene’s last true rockstars.”

Tracklisting:

Side 1:
1. Prequel
2. Popular Monster
3. All My Life
4. Ronald (feat. Tech N9ne & Alex Terrible)
5. Voices In My Head

Side 2:
1. Bad Guy (feat. Saraya)
2. Watch The World Burn
3. Trigger Warning
4. ZOMBIFIED
5. NO FEAR
6. Last Resort – Reimagined