This came out in 2003 – or at least that’s when I got it. Here’s what I said about it back then (with some minor editing):
Even punk rockers get their hearts broken.
Case in point: Rancid’s Tim Armstrong apparently had his smashed when his wife Brody (nee Dalle) — lead singer of The Distillers — left him a while back for Queens Of The Stone Age frontman Josh Homme. But in true what-doesn’t-kill-me-makes-me-stronger fashion, the singer-guitarist has used his broken marriage as fuel, fodder and grist for the musical mill of Indestructible, his Bay Area outfit’s defiantly titled sixth album and his most personal work to date.
“I had a bad year, a lot to go through,” the mush-mouthed Armstrong fesses up over the bouncy ska-punk of Fall Back Down. “I went way down / She betrayed me.” Later he puts it more emotionally: “My heart’s been ripped wide open.” Pretty sensitive talk from a punk icon. Thankfully, Armstrong doesn’t wallow in his grief and turn Indestructible into a full-on breakup album. True to their most typically politically form, plenty of these 19 cuts tackle global issues. The choppy rocker Out of Control rails against government oppression. The twangy Stand Your Ground salutes the homeless. The surprisingly melodic ballad Arrested in Shanghai chronicles the fate of an Asian activist. And there are plenty of hard-charging anthems to punk-rock and touring like Memphis, Road Block and Spirit of ’87. Even more satisfying, the album finds Rancid expanding their Clash-inspired sonic palette with some surfy guitars, plenty of organ, and some electronic backdrops nicked from Armstrong’s extracurricular project Transplants.
But make no mistake, the most memorable moments clome when Armstrong pins his tattered heart to the sleeve of his leather jacket and sneers, “If you lose me, you lose a good thing.” And like many a dumped musician, he appears to get his strength from his bandmates and his music. “I’ll keep listening to the great Joe Strummer,” he vows on the title cut. “’Cause through music we can live forever.” Even if we have to live alone.
