Dark Horse (Nickelback album)
Encyclopedia
Dark Horse is the sixth studio album
Studio album
A studio album is an album made up of tracks recorded in the controlled environment of a recording studio. A studio album contains newly written and recorded or previously unreleased or remixed material, distinguishing itself from a compilation or reissue album of previously recorded material, or...

 by the Canadian rock
Rock music
Rock music is a genre of popular music that developed during and after the 1960s, particularly in the United Kingdom and the United States. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, itself heavily influenced by rhythm and blues and country music...

 band Nickelback
Nickelback
Nickelback is a Canadian rock band from Hanna, Alberta. Since 1995 the band has included guitarist and lead vocalist Chad Kroeger, guitarist and back-up vocalist Ryan Peake and bassist Mike Kroeger.. The band's current drummer and percussionist is Daniel Adair who has been with the band since 2005....

, released on November 17, 2008 in Europe and a day later elsewhere. It is the follow-up to their multi-platinum selling All the Right Reasons
All the Right Reasons
All the Right Reasons is the fifth studio album by Canadian rock band Nickelback, released on October 4, 2005. It is the band's first album with former 3 Doors Down drummer Daniel Adair, who replaced Ryan Vikedal in January 2005...

 (2005), it was co-produced by the band and Grammy Award
Grammy Award
A Grammy Award — or Grammy — is an accolade by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States to recognize outstanding achievement in the music industry...

-winning producer and songwriter Robert John "Mutt" Lange, famous for working with such acts as Foreigner
Foreigner (band)
Foreigner is a British-American rock band, originally formed in 1976 by veteran English musicians Mick Jones and ex-King Crimson member Ian McDonald along with American vocalist Lou Gramm...

, AC/DC
AC/DC
AC/DC are an Australian rock band, formed in 1973 by brothers Malcolm and Angus Young. Commonly classified as hard rock, they are considered pioneers of heavy metal, though they themselves have always classified their music as simply "rock and roll"...

, Bryan Adams
Bryan Adams
Bryan Adams, is a Canadian rock singer-songwriter, guitarist, bassist, producer, actor and photographer. Adams has won dozens of awards and nominations, including 20 Juno Awards among 56 nominations. He has also received 15 Grammy Award nominations including a win for Best Song Written...

, Def Leppard
Def Leppard
Def Leppard are an English rock band formed in 1977 in Sheffield as part of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal movement. Since 1992, the band have consisted of Joe Elliott , Rick Savage , Rick Allen , Phil Collen , and Vivian Campbell...

 and Shania Twain
Shania Twain
Shania Twain, OC is a Canadian country pop singer-songwriter. Her album The Woman in Me , brought her fame and her 1997 album Come On Over, became the best-selling album of all time by a female musician in any genre, and the best-selling country album of all time. It has sold over 40 million...

. "Dark Horse" sold 326,000 in its first week and debuted at number 2 in the US. More than a year after its release, the album has not left the Top 100 on the Billboard 200
Billboard 200
The Billboard 200 is a ranking of the 200 highest-selling music albums and EPs in the United States, published weekly by Billboard magazine. It is frequently used to convey the popularity of an artist or groups of artists...

. In its 91st week, the album peaked at #46 on the latest issue, on the week of August 28, 2010. On 9 October, the album has since stayed there for 97 consecutive weeks, in the position of #71. The album has spent 125 consecutive weeks inside the Billboard 200
Billboard 200
The Billboard 200 is a ranking of the 200 highest-selling music albums and EPs in the United States, published weekly by Billboard magazine. It is frequently used to convey the popularity of an artist or groups of artists...

.

It was ranked #191 on Billboard
Billboard (magazine)
Billboard is a weekly American magazine devoted to the music industry, and is one of the oldest trade magazines in the world. It maintains several internationally recognized music charts that track the most popular songs and albums in various categories on a weekly basis...

s 200 Albums of the Decade, and is also the band's fourth straight Multi-Platinum selling album in the U.S. As of 2010 the album has sold 3 million copies in the United States and 5 million copies worldwide.

Promotion and singles

The first single from the album was "Gotta Be Somebody
Gotta Be Somebody
"Gotta Be Somebody" is the first official single released from Nickelback's sixth studio album, Dark Horse. Originally, the lead single from the album was set to be "If Today Was Your Last Day" but was changed instead to "Gotta Be Somebody". The song was digitally delivered to all formats on...

", which was released online for free digital download
Music download
A music download is the transferral of music from an Internet-facing computer or website to a user's local computer. This term encompasses both legal downloads and downloads of copyright material without permission or payment...

 on September 29, 2008, for a strict 24-hour period. "If Today Was Your Last Day
If Today Was Your Last Day
"If Today Was Your Last Day" is the second major single from Nickelback's sixth studio album Dark Horse. It was originally planned as the first single, to hit all U.S. radio formats September 30, 2008, but was scrapped as the first single in favour of "Gotta Be Somebody". Instead it was released...

" had been planned as the lead single but was scrapped at the last minute. The track "Something in Your Mouth
Something in Your Mouth
"Something in Your Mouth" is the second single and 1st promotional single released from Canadian rock band Nickelback's sixth studio album Dark Horse. The song was released as a digital download to the U.S. iTunes store on October 28, 2008. The song is much heavier than the first single "Gotta Be...

" became available for download from the United States iTunes Store
ITunes Store
The iTunes Store is a software-based online digital media store operated by Apple. Opening as the iTunes Music Store on April 28, 2003, with over 200,000 items to purchase, it is, as of April 2008, the number-one music vendor in the United States...

 on October 28, and was released to US rock radio airplay as the second single from the album on December 15. The song was a hit in 2009 in many countries, such as the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

. In Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

, it received little airplay.

In January 2009, the album's second mainstream single (third overall) was released: "I'd Come for You
I'd Come for You
"I'd Come for You" is the second European single from Nickelback's 2008 album Dark Horse. This was confirmed in January 2009 when the video shoot of the song was announced. The song was written by the band and Mutt Lange. It is a power ballad in the vein of the band's previous hits "Far Away" and...

", with Nigel Dick
Nigel Dick
Nigel Dick is an English music video and film director, writer and musician based in Los Angeles, California. He directed the Band Aid video "Do They Know It's Christmas?", as well as over 300 other music videos.Nigel Dick should not be confused with the Australian Dr...

 having made the music video
Music video
A music video or song video is a short film integrating a song and imagery, produced for promotional or artistic purposes. Modern music videos are primarily made and used as a marketing device intended to promote the sale of music recordings...

. Songs "Something in Your Mouth
Something in Your Mouth
"Something in Your Mouth" is the second single and 1st promotional single released from Canadian rock band Nickelback's sixth studio album Dark Horse. The song was released as a digital download to the U.S. iTunes store on October 28, 2008. The song is much heavier than the first single "Gotta Be...

" and "Burn It to the Ground
Burn It to the Ground
"Burn It to the Ground" is the fourth U.S. single released off of Canadian rock band Nickelback's sixth studio album Dark Horse.- Promotional use :...

", written by Kroeger, were released only to the rock radio stations
Rock music
Rock music is a genre of popular music that developed during and after the 1960s, particularly in the United Kingdom and the United States. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, itself heavily influenced by rhythm and blues and country music...

 in December 2008 and May 2009 respectively.

The exclusive Wal-Mart
Wal-Mart
Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. , branded as Walmart since 2008 and Wal-Mart before then, is an American public multinational corporation that runs chains of large discount department stores and warehouse stores. The company is the world's 18th largest public corporation, according to the Forbes Global 2000...

 edition of Dark Horse included a link to download an MP3 from Nickelback's performance of "This Afternoon" on Wal-Mart Soundcheck.

The album won numerous accolades at the 2009 Juno Awards, winning three out of five of its nominated awards including "Rock Album of the Year".

Dark Horse was certified platinum
Music recording sales certification
Music recording sales certification is a system of certifying that a music recording has shipped or sold a certain number of copies, where the threshold quantity varies by type and by nation or territory .Almost all countries follow variations of the RIAA certification categories,...

 by the Recording Industry Association of America
Recording Industry Association of America
The Recording Industry Association of America is a trade organization that represents the recording industry distributors in the United States...

 (RIAA) on December 9, 2008, only three weeks after its North American release. The album also remained in the top 20 on the Billboard 200 for weeks after its release. The album was certified two times platinum in April 2009, and had by April 2010 sold over 3 million copies in the U.S.
Burn it to the Ground was also nominated for Best Hard Rock Performance at the 52nd Grammy Awards
52nd Grammy Awards
The 52nd Annual Grammy Awards took place on January 31, 2010, at Staples Center in Los Angeles, California. Neil Young was honored as the 2010 MusiCares Person of the Year on January 29, two days prior to the Grammy telecast. Only ten of the 109 awards were received during the broadcast...

 but lost to AC/DC
AC/DC
AC/DC are an Australian rock band, formed in 1973 by brothers Malcolm and Angus Young. Commonly classified as hard rock, they are considered pioneers of heavy metal, though they themselves have always classified their music as simply "rock and roll"...

's "War Machine".
On September 13, 2010, the album re-entered the German Albums Chart at No. 30, 21 months after its debut and almost 6 months after its last entry on that chart.

Track listing

Wal-Mart exclusive bonus track
  1. "This Afternoon" (Original Performance Series) – 4:26


Australian singles
  1. "Gotta Be Somebody
    Gotta Be Somebody
    "Gotta Be Somebody" is the first official single released from Nickelback's sixth studio album, Dark Horse. Originally, the lead single from the album was set to be "If Today Was Your Last Day" but was changed instead to "Gotta Be Somebody". The song was digitally delivered to all formats on...

    "
  2. "I'd Come for You
    I'd Come for You
    "I'd Come for You" is the second European single from Nickelback's 2008 album Dark Horse. This was confirmed in January 2009 when the video shoot of the song was announced. The song was written by the band and Mutt Lange. It is a power ballad in the vein of the band's previous hits "Far Away" and...

    "
  3. "If Today Was Your Last Day
    If Today Was Your Last Day
    "If Today Was Your Last Day" is the second major single from Nickelback's sixth studio album Dark Horse. It was originally planned as the first single, to hit all U.S. radio formats September 30, 2008, but was scrapped as the first single in favour of "Gotta Be Somebody". Instead it was released...

    "
  4. "Never Gonna Be Alone
    Never Gonna Be Alone
    "Never Gonna Be Alone" is the 6th overall single since off of Nickelback's sixth studio album Dark Horse...

    "
  5. "Burn It to the Ground
    Burn It to the Ground
    "Burn It to the Ground" is the fourth U.S. single released off of Canadian rock band Nickelback's sixth studio album Dark Horse.- Promotional use :...

    "
  6. "This Afternoon
    This Afternoon (song)
    "This Afternoon" is the eighth and final single from rock band Nickelback's sixth studio album Dark Horse, released on March 23, 2010.-Music video:A music video for the song was released on May 4....

    "

Reception

The album received mixed to negative reviews, shown by an average of 49 out of 100 on the review aggregator Metacritic
Metacritic
Metacritic.com is a website that collates reviews of music albums, games, movies, TV shows and DVDs. For each product, a numerical score from each review is obtained and the total is averaged. An excerpt of each review is provided along with a hyperlink to the source. Three colour codes of Green,...

. However, it received a positive review and won the Juno Award
Juno Award
The Juno Awards are presented annually to Canadian musical artists and bands to acknowledge their artistic and technical achievements in all aspects of music...

 for Album of the Year, a category whose nominees are the top five selling Canadian releases of the year. Despite this award, the critical reception of the album has been mainly very negative.

Stephen Thomas Erlewin of Allmusic gave Dark Horse 1.5/5, writing, "Nickelback are a gnarled, vulgar band reveling in their ignorance of the very notion of taste, lacking either the smarts or savvy to wallow in bad taste so they just get ugly, knocking out knuckle-dragging riffs that seem rarefied in comparison to their thick, boneheaded words." Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly is an American magazine, published by the Time division of Time Warner, that covers film, television, music, broadway theatre, books and popular culture...

 reviewer Leah Greenblatt wrote, "It's hard not to be put off by the execrable lyrics of album opener "Something in Your Mouth" (the song is basically kryptonite for feminists)." PopMatters
PopMatters
PopMatters is an international webzine of cultural criticism that covers many aspects of popular culture. PopMatters publishes reviews, interviews, and detailed essays on most cultural products and expressions in areas such as music, television, films, books, video games, comics, sports, theater,...

 criticised the band's release, giving it 3/10 and saying it was a step down from previous albums: "Dark Horse finds the group at a creative low point. Each song sounds like an older, better Nickelback hit, and Kroeger only once displays his prior songwriting strength with the sad-bastard portrait 'Just to Get High'." The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...

 awarded the album 1/5, being particularly negative of the band's cliché
Cliché
A cliché or cliche is an expression, idea, or element of an artistic work which has been overused to the point of losing its original meaning or effect, especially when at some earlier time it was considered meaningful or novel. In phraseology, the term has taken on a more technical meaning,...

 style; "Nickelback's music reaffirms every sex-and-stupidity cliche hard rock can offer."

Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone is a US-based magazine devoted to music, liberal politics, and popular culture that is published every two weeks. Rolling Stone was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and music critic Ralph J...

 gave the album a positive review, complimenting its production. ""Mutt" Lange lightens Nickelback's dreary post-grunge plod, applying guitar shimmer to prom ballads and detonating big beats under frat-party shouts and raplike vocal parts." Whilst ChartAttack credited the band's success to knowing its target audience: "Chad Kroeger is a genius because he knows exactly what people want and precisely how far he can go. He turned out an extremely racy album that's loaded with songs about gettin' drunk and doin' it all without breaking any taboos, and with enough love and moral authority to grease its passage into the mainstream. Rejoice, North America. This is your world." Billboard
Billboard (magazine)
Billboard is a weekly American magazine devoted to the music industry, and is one of the oldest trade magazines in the world. It maintains several internationally recognized music charts that track the most popular songs and albums in various categories on a weekly basis...

 also praised the album's content: "The bulletproof Nickelback provides affordable fun that promises good returns in hard times."

Chart performance

Chart (2008) Peak
position
U.S. Billboard 200
Billboard 200
The Billboard 200 is a ranking of the 200 highest-selling music albums and EPs in the United States, published weekly by Billboard magazine. It is frequently used to convey the popularity of an artist or groups of artists...

 
2
U.S. Billboard Top Rock Albums  1
U.S. Billboard Top Hard Rock Albums  1
U.S. Billboard Top Modern Rock/Alternative Albums  1
U.S. Billboard Top Internet Albums  2
Canadian Albums Chart
Canadian Albums Chart
The Canadian Albums Chart is the official album sales chart in Canada. It is compiled every Wednesday by U.S.-based music sales tracking company Nielsen Soundscan, and published every Thursday by Jam! Canoe and Billboard, along with its sister charts the Canadian Singles Chart and the Canadian BDS...

 
1
Australian Albums Chart
ARIA Charts
The ARIA charts are the main Australian music sales charts, issued weekly by the Australian Recording Industry Association. The charts are a record of the highest selling singles and albums in various genres in Australia. ARIA commenced compiling its own charts in-house from the week ending 26 June...

 
3
New Zealand Albums Chart
Recording Industry Association of New Zealand
The Recording Industry Association of New Zealand is a non-profit trade association of record producers, distributors and recording artists who sell music in New Zealand...

3
UK Albums Chart
UK Albums Chart
The UK Albums Chart is a list of albums ranked by physical and digital sales in the United Kingdom. It is compiled every week by The Official Charts Company and broadcast on a Sunday on BBC Radio 1 , and published in Music Week magazine and on the OCC website .To qualify for the UK albums chart...

4
Germany Albums Chart
Media Control Charts
The official music charts in Germany are gathered and published by the company Media Control GfK International on behalf of Bundesverband Musikindustrie...

4
Austrian Albums Chart 5
Swiss Albums Chart 5
Swedish Albums Chart 9
Russian Albums Chart 11
Irish Albums Chart
Irish Albums Chart
The Irish Albums Chart is the Irish music industry standard albums popularity chart issued weekly by the Irish Recorded Music Association and compiled on its behalf by Chart-Track. Chart rankings are based on sales, which are compiled through over-the-counter retail data captured electronically...

19
Finnish Albums Chart 19
Netherlands Albums Chart 25
Italian Albums Chart 26
Belgium Albums Chart 35
Denmark Albums Chart 37
French Albums Chart 112

Year-end charts

Chart (2010) Position
US Billboard 200
Billboard 200
The Billboard 200 is a ranking of the 200 highest-selling music albums and EPs in the United States, published weekly by Billboard magazine. It is frequently used to convey the popularity of an artist or groups of artists...

42

Year-end charts

Chart (2009) Position
Swiss Albums Chart 64

Worldwide certifications and sales

  • Canada: 6 × Platinum
  • USA: 3 × Platinum
  • Australia: 3 × Platinum
  • New Zealand: Platinum
  • UK: Platinum
  • Europe: Platinum
  • Germany: Platinum
  • Sweden: Gold
  • GCC: Platinum

  • Worldwide sales: 5,000,000+ copies

Chart procession and succession

Personnel

Nickelback
  • Chad Kroeger
    Chad Kroeger
    Chad Robert Kroeger is aCanadian songwriter, singer, and guitarist best known as the lead vocalist and guitarist for the Canadian rock band Nickelback...

     – lead vocals, guitar
    Guitar
    The guitar is a plucked string instrument, usually played with fingers or a pick. The guitar consists of a body with a rigid neck to which the strings, generally six in number, are attached. Guitars are traditionally constructed of various woods and strung with animal gut or, more recently, with...

  • Ryan Peake – guitar
    Guitar
    The guitar is a plucked string instrument, usually played with fingers or a pick. The guitar consists of a body with a rigid neck to which the strings, generally six in number, are attached. Guitars are traditionally constructed of various woods and strung with animal gut or, more recently, with...

    , backing vocals
  • Mike Kroeger – bass
    Bass guitar
    The bass guitar is a stringed instrument played primarily with the fingers or thumb , or by using a pick....

  • Daniel Adair
    Daniel Adair
    Daniel Patrick Adair is a Canadian drummer best known as the current drummer for Canadian rock band Nickelback and his previous work with American rock band 3 Doors Down...

     – drums
    Drum kit
    A drum kit is a collection of drums, cymbals and often other percussion instruments, such as cowbells, wood blocks, triangles, chimes, or tambourines, arranged for convenient playing by a single person ....


Production personnel
  • Mutt Lange – production
  • Joey Moi – production, mixing
    Audio mixing (recorded music)
    In audio recording, audio mixing is the process by which multiple recorded sounds are combined into one or more channels, most commonly two-channel stereo. In the process, the source signals' level, frequency content, dynamics, and panoramic position are manipulated and effects such as reverb may...

     on "Gotta Be Somebody", "Never Gonna Be Alone" and "This Afternoon"
  • Randy Staub – mixing
  • Zach Blackstone – mixing assistance


Additional production personnel
  • Chris Lord-Alge
    Chris Lord-Alge
    Chris Lord-Alge is a mixer who has worked on various albums. He is the brother of Tom Lord-Alge, another audio engineer. Chris Lord-Alge is known for his extreme use of dynamic range compression in both hardware and software plug-in versions....

     – mixing on "I'd Come for You"
  • Nik Karpen – mixing assistance on "I'd Come for You"
  • Keith Armstrong – mixing assistance on "I'd Come for You"
  • Mike Shipley – mixing on "If Today Was Your Last Day"
  • Brian Wohlgemuth – mixing assistance on "If Today Was Your Last Day"
  • Ted Jensen
    Ted Jensen
    Ted Jensen is an American recording engineer. Jensen is the chief mastering engineer at Sterling Sound. He started his career as a mastering engineer in 1976 and is currently the most active Mastering Engineer in the industry...

     – mastering
    Audio mastering
    Mastering, a form of audio post-production, is the process of preparing and transferring recorded audio from a source containing the final mix to a data storage device ; the source from which all copies will be produced...

  • Olle Romo – editing, additional engineering
    Audio engineering
    An audio engineer, also called audio technician, audio technologist or sound technician, is a specialist in a skilled trade that deals with the use of machinery and equipment for the recording, mixing and reproduction of sounds. The field draws on many artistic and vocational areas, including...

  • Scott Cooke – editing, additional engineering


Release history

Region Date Label Catalogue
Australia 15 November 2008 Warner Music
Warner Music Group
Warner Music Group is the third largest business group and family of record labels in the recording industry, making it one of the big four record companies...

RR 8028-2
Europe 17 November 2008
United States November 18, 2008 Roadrunner
Roadrunner Records
Roadrunner Records is an American record label that concentrates primarily on heavy metal bands. It is currently a subsidiary of Warner Music Group.-History:...

Canada EMI

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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