Fall Out Boy is here for Aug 6 concert

SINGAPORE

FALL OUT BOY SAVE ROCK & ROLL TOUR SINGAPORE

Where: Fort Canning Park

When: Augst 6, Tuesday, 8pm

Admission: $110 from Sistic. Call 6348-5555 or go to www.sistic.com.sg

Making music is easy; it is keeping the band together that is difficult, says Pete Wentz, the bass player and the most prominent member in American rock group Fall Out Boy.

He should know. The band are currently riding high on the back of a successful comeback album, Save Rock And Roll, their first release after the quartet took a four-year hiatus.

The break has done the band a world of good, and the mood among the members has never been better, he tells Life! in a telephone interview from St Petersburg in Russia, one of the stops on their current global tour. It includes a gig here at Fort Canning Park on Tuesday.

"We're older now... I think we respect one another and we understand this thing that is Fall Out Boy and understand that it's a precious thing," says the 34-year-old.

"It takes a lot, being in a band. And getting up on stage and playing the songs is the easy part. Everything else that comes along with it, it's like being in a relationship. It's the same thing like when you take a relationship for granted, it gets bad. I think we understand and appreciate that now."

The four members all took time out to work on other music projects. Lead singer and guitarist Patrick Stump released a solo EP, Truant Wave, and album, Soul Punk, in 2011, while Wentz formed electropop group Black Cards with other musicians. Guitarist Joe Trohman and drummer Andy Hurley kept themselves busy with heavy metal supergroup The Damned Things.

To their fans' delight, Fall Out Boy made a surprise announcement in February this year that the four had secretly recorded a new album and will be touring again.

Save Rock And Roll, released in April, was a hit and went to No. 1 on the Billboard charts. It was their second album release to hit the top spot after Infinity On High in 2007.

At press time, the single Alone Together from the latest album was at No. 2 on the Hot 30 Countdown chart, which is based on votes from listeners of home-grown radio station Hot FM 91.3.

The positive reaction to their comeback was a surprise, says Wentz, who was formerly married to pop singer Ashlee Simpson. They have a four-year-old son.

"We didn't have any expectations when we were going into it. If you don't have any expectations, it would mean that if the album hasn't done what it's doing, that would have been okay," he says.

But the good response, he adds, was "mind blowing".

The band were formed in Illinois in 2001 by Wentz and Trohman, then active members of the Chicago hardcore music scene. Stump and Hurley were recruited later and the band named themselves after a character from the iconic animated series, The Simpsons.

In 2006, the band were nominated for a Best New Artist Grammy award on the strength of their second album, From Under The Cork Tree. They have since earned several music accolades over the years, including several wins at the Kerrang! and MTV Video Music awards.

The upcoming gig will be the band's third show here - they played at the Singapore Indoor Stadium in 2009 and the Max Pavilion in 2007, both to 4,000-strong crowds.

Speaking of their last visit here, Wentz says: "I remember going to the zoo and walking around. It was nice out, the weather was really amazing."

He describes Changi airport as "the most insane airport I've ever been in".

"It had a butterfly sanctuary and stuff like that."

The show, too, was a lot of fun, he adds.

He is looking forward to coming back and promises it will "definitely be a bigger and better show".

"We know how to play songs better, we know what we want out of the songs, we're excited."

dinohadi@sph.com.sg

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