Nickelback released Dark Horse on November 18, 2008, in the United States. Their sixth studio album brought producer Robert John “Mutt” Lange into a team that also included the band and longtime collaborator Joey Moi. Its 11 tracks stretched from the romantic longing of “Gotta Be Somebody” to the heavy riffs and hard-partying chorus of “Burn It to the Ground.”
The follow-up to 2005’s All the Right Reasons came with a substantial challenge. “There’s a mountain sitting behind us,” Chad Kroeger told Billboard before its release, describing the expectations created by the previous record. That album was still finding fresh momentum in Europe while Nickelback worked on its successor. The band was writing and recording new music while promoting songs that had already kept them busy for years, and Kroeger admitted he would have preferred a longer break.
Work with Lange began in March 2008, when Nickelback traveled to Switzerland to develop song ideas. Summer sessions followed at Chad’s converted barn studio in British Columbia. In a band biography published by WWE, guitarist Ryan Peake described the decision to share control with a producer they had wanted to work with for years. Lange also contributed as a songwriter, with credits on “Never Gonna Be Alone” and “This Afternoon.”
For bassist Mike Kroeger, Lange’s contribution reached directly into the way he played. In a Trace Elliot interview published by Peavey, he described himself as a minimalist who generally built his parts around the drums. Lange, a bassist himself, encouraged him to listen more closely to the singing and develop lines that supported the melody. Some of the suggestions initially felt beyond Mike’s usual approach. Working through them gave the bass a different relationship with the rest of the song: it could respond to the vocal as well as reinforce the beat. Mike said he learned a great deal about his instrument during those sessions.
The material also drew on ideas Nickelback had left unfinished and music they had grown up around. “If Today Was Your Last Day” had existed before the sessions without reaching completion; Chad returned to it during the album’s development. At the other end of the record, “This Afternoon” closed the set with acoustic guitars and a country flavor. In the WWE biography, Mike connected that feel to the country music people listened to where the band grew up. Both songs gave the album room beyond the heavier material introduced by “Something in Your Mouth.”
“Gotta Be Somebody” became a top-10 single on the Billboard Hot 100. The album entered the Billboard 200 at No. 2 with 326,000 copies sold in its first week, giving Nickelback a substantial opening as the new songs began their own run.
The scale carried over to the stage. During the album’s touring cycle in 2010, Chad told Noisecreep that the production traveled in roughly 14 trucks with about 80 crew members. He wanted audiences overseas to see the full show, even when transporting it meant the band could sell out arenas and still only break even.
“Burn It to the Ground” also earned Nickelback a nomination for Best Hard Rock Performance at the 2010 Grammy Awards.
