RISE AGAINST Shares New Single 'Prizefighter'

On the heels of playing Los Angeles’s Kia Forum, and releasing recent single “Nod” — “the anthem we need right now” (Vice) — RISE AGAINST has shared its second new single of 2025. Out now on Loma Vista Recordings, “Prizefighter” illustrates the internal battle between making art, maintaining autonomy and meeting the demands of the present day’s never-ending, rapidly shifting attention span.

RISE AGAINST vocalist and lyricist Tim McIlrath says: “‘Prizefighter’ is about a compulsion to create, that then creates an audience, and then your connection with that audience and your responsibilities to that audience, and how much an artist is obliged to that audience. It’s trying to reconcile the shift from spectator to the public arena, and what you owe the people that are your fans versus what you owe your own mental health.”

The “Prizefighter” music video showcases the symbolism behind the song, the roaring energy of RISE AGAINST‘s live shows and the deep devotion of the band’s fans.

“Prizefighter” follows RISE AGAINST‘s blazing return with “Nod” — the band’s first new single in three years — which arrived days after the U.S. presidential inauguration, and delivered “a particularly potent rallying cry for the moment” (Rolling Stone). Quickly uniting millions in its call for community and compassion, encouraging listeners to not sit idly by as world events, societal changes and technology shape our ways of life, rise against have since toured across three continents this year, and have made “Nod” a highlight of their live sets.

Produced by Catherine Marks (BOYGENIUS, FOALS, MANCHESTER ORCHESTRA, ST. VINCENT) and mixed by Alan Moulder (NINE INCH NAILS, PARAMORE, QUEENS OF THE STONE AGE, THE KILLERS),“Prizefighter” now marks a propulsive page-turn in RISE AGAINST‘s next chapter, revealing another side of the band’s outspoken perspective and prescient point of view.

Like the body of multi-gold and platinum hits that have come before, “Prizefighter” and “Nod” further amplify the type of invigorating music, defiant messages and bulletproof melodies that have earned billions of streams, filled arenas, topped charts, broken records, and, above all, joined fans in an embrace of vital issues. Just as the stakes could not be higher, the Chicago punk rock band is back bigger, louder and more progressive than ever.

Currently in the midst of their “Rise Of The Roach” tour, bandmembers Tim McIlrath (lead vocals/guitar),Joe Principe (bass/vocals),Zach Blair (guitar/vocals) and Brandon Barnes (drums) will be on the road all year long, with a slew of summer festivals, dozens of arena and amphitheater shows, and more on the horizon, all throughout the U.S. and abroad.

In a recent interview with Oran O’Beirne of Overdrive, McIlrath spoke about “Nod”, which will appear on RISE AGAINST‘s upcoming follow-up to 2021’s “Nowhere Generation” album, tentatively due later in the year. Regarding when the ideas for the new material came together, Tim said: “Let’s see if I can remember. It came after the tour. We were really focused on ‘Nowhere Generation’ when we were touring. And then we wrapped that up. We took a break, which is pretty standard for us. The touring, it’s intense and it takes a lot out of you. And that’s kind of our moment where everyone can kind of go reconnect with home and then kind of recharge your batteries. And so we started writing probably a few months after we got off the road from ‘Nowhere Gen’. We weren’t really rushing or pressuring ourselves.

“This is our tenth record — we’ve been doing this for a long time — and so it’s very organic in terms of timing,” he explained. “We write when we feel that urgency to write. We record when we feel like it’s ready. We don’t do anything that’s too rushed. And so that was this record, was when ideas started percolating and we started sharing them. We were, like, ‘Okay, I think we have some songs here. Let’s start putting them together.’ And then we just took our time putting those songs together.”

Asked if he and his bandmates still get nervous when they are about to release new music in terms of how it will be received by the RISE AGAINST fans, Tim said: “By the time we release it, by the time you hear it, it had to get through so many checks and balances just for the four of us — every single note, part, lyric, sound — and I’m really confident in the song at that point; we’re all really confident. So it’s, like, this is the best version of RISE AGAINST in 2025. And so, aside from that, there’s nothing I can do about how people accept it. And that goes back to when you were first a band, and you took that leap of, like, ‘I’m just gonna make music and put it out there.’ And it was a surprise to see that anybody connected to it. And so, in that sense, I’m I’m always appreciative, because I don’t expect people to love our band, I don’t expect them to love our songs. I’m always consistently appreciative. There’s a lot of gratitude when someone goes, ‘Oh, I love this song.’ Especially when you put out a song this late in our career, people are, like, ‘Yo, this is a great song. That’s awesome.’ That’s what you want. And if people don’t like it, that’s kind of okay too. We’re not out here trying to shove anything down anybody’s throat. But if you’re hearing a new RISE AGAINST song, you’re hearing what we think is the best version of ourselves right now.”

As for whether “Nod” is a good representation of what fans can expect to hear on RISE AGAINST‘s upcoming album, Tim said: “Yeah, if I had to piece it in a group of songs that we’ve put together, ‘Nod’ is probably among the more traditional RISE AGAINST. I think that you hear it and you hear RISE AGAINST, you hear sort of what we’ve done and what we have been doing, but in a little bit of a new way. So I think it falls in the category of pretty like traditional RISE, which is a sound that we will always embrace. And there’s stuff on the record, I think, that will be less traditional, for sure.”