Content
Song writing
Brett Gurewitz: "I don't feel like we stretched ourselves at all; [New Maps Of Hell] was a little bit regressive and conservative."[1]. He also said in 2007: "I think we're reaching back to our roots as a garage band and doing some really aggressive music. But we're also trying to look forward and write some really interesting new rock songs."[2]
Recording
It was the first time they ever tracked and laid overdubs at a place called Grand Master in Hollywood, CA. They had the exact same Neve console as they have at Sound City, so Joe Barresi was comfortable working there. All the background vocals were recorded at Brett's house.[3]
On this album Jay used a '78 Fender Precision bass guitar:
Double-disc
On Bad Religion's 2006 DVD Live At The Palladium Brett hinted that New Maps of Hell would be a double-disc. This later turned into the deluxe edition, which contained 3 new songs (Won't Somebody, Adam's Atoms and Chronophobia).
Tracklist
In May 2007, Brett mentioned that 27 songs were conceived but only 16 (including 52 Seconds) made the final cut of the album.[4]
About 4 months prior to the release of New Maps Of Hell the tracklist was changed quite a bit. And, instead of the original 17 songs, the final release only contains 16, as New Chapter was dropped. Further, Requiem was changed into Requiem For Dissent.
Regarding New Chapter, Jay replied: "New Chapter will probably not see the light of day.. it was a good song, but it ran into insurmountable issues that we couldn't rectify. maybe we can give it a try next time again...".
| March 2007 | Final |
| 01. New Dark Ages 02. Grains of Wrath 03. Fields of Mars 04. Germs of Perfection 05. Requiem 06. Submission Complete 07. The Grand Delusion 08. Honest Goodbye 09. Prodigal Son 10. Before You Die 11. Lost Pilgrim 12. Heroes and Martyrs 13. Dearly Beloved 14. New Chapter 15. Murder 16. 52 Seconds 17. Scrutiny |
01. 52 Seconds 02. Heroes & Martyrs 03. Germs of Perfection 04. New Dark Ages 05. Requiem for Dissent 06. Before You Die 07. Honest Goodbye 08. Dearly Beloved 09. Grains of Wrath 10. Murder 11. Scrutiny 12. Prodigal Son 13. The Grand Delusion 14. Lost Pilgrim 15. Submission Complete 16. Fields of Mars |
Album title
Greg Hetson: "We were doing a photo shoot for the record, in the middle of the recording of it. It was at a record store. There was some vinyl. We saw it was one of the titles of somebody's songs. Kinda lifted it from there."
Brett: "[W]e all liked the concept of maps, because we are exploring new material on this record, both musically and topically."[5]
Artwork
The images are wood engraving illustrations by Gustave Doré (1832 - 1883), a French artist, engraver, illustrator and sculptor. Doré worked primarily with wood engraving and steel engraving. Here depicted is a scene from Dante's The Divine Comedy, which is widely considered the central epic poem of Italian literature, and is seen as one of the greatest works of world literature. This theme is a reference to How Could Hell Be Any Worse?, where another illustration from this set was used as artwork.
| Pier della Vigna | Hypocrites |
 |
 |
Lasting Legacy
Brett in 2020: "Looking back on New Maps I guess I'd have to say "New Dark Ages" has "aged" pretty well. Feels like it's ironic chorus warning against science denial and anti-intellectualism applies more to the world today than it did when written. And "Honest Goodbye" with it's low-tuned guitars and Truman Capote-inspired lyrics has always been one of our weirder songs but a sentimental favorite of mine. Sometimes a book hits me hard and inspires a song and in this case it was Capote's In Cold Blood that led to the song."
Guest musicians
Vanna (former band on Epitaph) contributed vocals.
References
^ MySpace.com (2007)