Just before the Thanksgiving Break, Fall Out Boy took to the airwaves of Zayne Lowe’s BBC One show to release not only a new track, but news about their sixth studio album which is set to be released in the new year.

The album will be called American Beauty/American Psycho and will be out worldwide on Jan. 20, just in time for the new semester to start. The title track was played on BBC One and has already been catching mixed reviews from critics and fans alike.

Now, fans of Fall Out Boy shouldn’t be shocked by a musical shift in direction as they’ve done this quite often in their career. We can all remember that when Follie a Deux dropped in 2008 many cried out that “they wanted the band to go back to Take This To Your Grave” and some even believed that it was the negative feedback on the album that prompted the hiatus.

Even Save Rock and Roll was different, albeit there were elements of previous albums but there seemed to be no fuss over that because the fans had gotten their boys back.

With this new song being released it seems like the fanbase is back to their old FOB shaming ways and to be honest…it frustrates me to no end. Of course a band tries new things and new sounds over the course of their career, that’s exactly what music and art is!

If Fall Out Boy released album after album of Take This To Your Grave-esque songs, not only would the fans get bored of hearing it but the band would get tired of playing as well. To be an artist means taking in everything around you, your experiences, and expressing them in song.

My favorite artists are those who use their art like a diary; I can tell the experiences they went through or the moods they were in just by the album or song I’m listening to. I will admit that “American Beauty/American Psycho” is going to take a little time to get used to for me. The chorus is very poppy, and reminds me a little bit of the theme song to the show Code Monkeys but the verses really get back into the dig of Stump’s voice that I love so much.

The band wrote of the song throughout their social media sites saying, ““We thought about where this all began but razing it and starting again, so we reached out to a kindred spirit in Sebastian- from the past he mined some of the future. The mission is the heart pure and simple as it can be- distilled but never fragmented or disguised. Through these experiments, that were sometimes lost in translation, we persevered- ‘they tried to bury us but they didnt realize we were seeds’…”

I think that while this song might not be everyone’s cup of tea, the first single off the album, “Centuries” just proves that there is still strength on this album and artfully structured lyrics that we know and love from Pete and Patrick. Anybody who says they’re swearing off the Chicago boys for good are closing themselves out from what has the makings of another amazing release.

Preorders will begin Dec. 15 and the single “American Beauty/American Psycho” will be released Dec. 8. Those who purchase the preorder will receive the title track, “Centuries,” and one other song which has not been released yet. I, for one, am excited and ready for anything Fall Out Boy puts out. No matter what direction they choose, I’ll be loyally following behind them.