Album Review: The Offspring - Days Go By

Four years following the release of their previous record, and 23 after their studio debut, The Offspring return with album number nine, Days Go By. Having initially scheduled this latest offering as a chaser to Rise And Fall, Rage And Grace (2008), the Californian punk-rock-pop group have since tinkered with the material with an aim of bringing fresh production to the record.

Opening the album, The Future Is Now is an efficient summation of the 42-minute listen that follows – with 'fresh' failing to make the list of adjectives that best describes the experience. With no singular or obvious driving force behind the music (besides from the fact that it has come into existence), the track plays through lacking in emotional impulse and creative propulsion. It makes for an introduction to a tracklisting that is so varied in theme, genre and sentiment that it fails to engage as an album. What occurs is a listen akin to that of an anthology of b-sides from The Offspring – even featuring a re-recording of the band's 1992 tune, Dirty Magic.

While Days Go By showcases The Offspring's ability to span genre and sub-genre, it does so with little cohesion between individual tracks – distorting any vision the band might have started with when recording commenced three years ago. The result is an assortment of songs that is at times entertaining, but for the most part is a strain to listen to.

Days Go By is an uneven breakdown of The Offspring's shifting styles and musical passages (from the early-1980s through to now), which by album's end emerges as an easily forgettable snapshot of this successful band.