New Maps of Hell

In a world ruled increasingly by superstition and intolerance, Bad Religion's rousing wall-of-sound punk seems about as necessary now as ever before. It is the impassioned sound of reason, anthems of a bittersweet idealism and a guarded hope set to propulsive guitars and charging drumbeats. And while most groups with even half the artistic output have long ago morphed into stylistic self-parody, Bad Religion is currently surging forward with a renewed creative intensity. Their fourteenth album is both a nod to the band's defiant past and an undeniable step forward in the evolution of a genre they helped to define.