Nickelback released Here and Now in the United States and Canada on November 21, 2011. Their seventh studio album followed 2008’s Dark Horse, with a campaign that put two different sides of the band out front. Roadrunner selected “When We Stand Together” for pop radio and “Bottoms Up” for rock stations, scheduling both for September 26. Listeners didn’t have to wait for a later single to hear how the band would approach each audience.
The record was made at Mountain View Studios in British Columbia, with Nickelback taking the lead in production. Bassist Mike Kroeger explained the arrangement in a 2012 interview with HARD FORCE: the band handled most of the work, joined by returning collaborator Joey Moi and longtime friend Brian Howes. Howes worked with them on the second half of the album.
Chad Kroeger wanted that record to cover plenty of ground. Speaking to the Associated Press in October 2011, he described a recurring ambition to push the band’s heavier material and its melodic writing further on the same album. “When you listen to this record, it sounds like it could be from four different artists,” he said. The two lead singles made that intention part of the release campaign from the start.
The opening track, “This Means War,” took the guitars particularly low. Mike described its lyrics to HARD FORCE as a response to feeling threatened and having to meet a challenge, while declining to explain the personal experience behind Chad’s words. In a 2012 Total Guitar interview, Chad described using a seven-string tuned down to A sharp for the song. He explained that tunings followed the needs of the vocal: the band adjusted keys to keep verses from becoming too low and choruses from climbing too high, then chose a guitar to match. Those decisions also meant carrying guitars in multiple tunings, with backups for each.
Chad also valued guitarist Ryan Peake’s different approach, including his strumming patterns; he felt the contrast gave the band more to work with. Writing didn’t always begin in the same place. Chad said heavier songs often developed from a riff, while more melodic material might start with a chorus or central theme. He was equally willing to shorten a section once it lost his interest. “We like things to be concise,” he told the magazine. He also rejected the idea of concentrating on a few obvious singles and treating the remaining tracks as less important; the detail mattered across the record.
That editing instinct fits the finished album’s scale: 11 tracks in just under 40 minutes. “This Means War,” “Bottoms Up” and “When We Stand Together” occupy the first three positions, putting the heavier opener and both lead singles together before the record reaches songs such as “Lullaby” and “Trying Not to Love You.” The running order gives listeners that range early, within a compact album.
The release also began a new Canadian partnership with Universal Music Canada, announced alongside Roadrunner. Its U.S. opening week produced nearly 227,000 sales and a No. 2 debut on the Billboard 200. Billboard counted Here and Now as Nickelback’s fifth top-10 album and their third consecutive album to enter the chart’s top two.
