So Deadly My Dear

So Deadly My Dear is the eleventh studio album by American Alternative Pop Rock band The New Romantic Devils, released on April 14, 2023, through One Sexy Devil Records. A concept album, dubbed a "punk pop rock opera" by the band members, It follows the story of Sasha Deadly, a undercover American agent anti-hero. The album expresses the disillusionment and dissent of a generation that came of age in a period shaped by tumultuous events such as the pandemic mass shootings, the election, the Russian Ukraine war and previous events like 911 and the Iraq war, and how it has all been orchestrated through a secret waring faction underground to overthrow peace and harmony and cause division an chaos. The protagonist is a double agent working in reality for the Light brigade a group trying to counter and bring unity to the country and peace to the world. 
Following the disappointing sales of their previous album Somewhere between Heaven and Hell. the band took a break and then began what they had planned to be their next album, The band had contemplated breaking up and going to do individual projects. Once recording started on Rachel and Archies solo albums, they decided they had ideas for things that would make a great The New Romantic Devils Record. Archie also met with Keith Hudson and convinced him to come back to the fold and work on new project. 
So Deadly My Dear
Studio album 	The New Romantic Devils
Released 	14 April 2023
Recorded 	February 12- 23-March 4, 2023
March 6- 16 2023
March 24-28 2023
March 31-April 3, 2023
April 6-April 9, 2023
Studio 	The Sandbox (Fort Worth, Texas) [Archie home studio]
Windmill Lane Studios (Dublin Ireland)
Sonic Ranch (Texas)
Sundog Recording Studios (Nashville)
The Attic (Louisiana)
Electric Lady Studios (New York)
Genre 	Pop Alternative Rock
Label 	One Sexy Devil
Producer 	Bob Zanka
Engineered and Mastered	Bob Zanka
Atom
== Background[edit] ==
Things had come to a point regarding unresolved personal issues between the band members. The band was argumentative and miserable, according to band member Ed Anziotti, and needed to "shift directions". In addition, the band's last release had been not well received and the band had felt it was more of a vehicle for a solo record for Rachel Monroe. Archie Monroe had called Rachel and asked her, "Do you wanna do [the band] anymore?" He felt insecure, having become "fascinated and horrified" by his reckless lifestyle, and his marriage was in jeopardy. Rachel and Ed along with Keith had viewed the guitarist as controlling, while Archie feared to show his bandmates new songs and that it was all coming to an end. Beginning in Late February 2023, the group had weekly personal discussions, which resulted in a revitalized feeling among the musicians. They settled on more musical input from Ed and Keith as well as collaboration from the touring musicians , with "more respect and less criticism".
After Mediation between the brother and sister duo they both decided to work on solo projects and take a break from the band. Rachel began working at Archie's studio opposite him and asked him for some advice and help along with Ed Anziotti. Archie had began conversations with his longtime band mate and best friend Keith Hudson to help with his solo project as well. During the recording sessions the four of them began to be inspired to write together and in turn to work on a new band record. Keith made the decision to rejoin his bandmates. While Rachel was working on her solo record, she had two ideas for concept records and presented them to Archie, Keith, and Ed. They decided on the second one and went to work on their next record. between all the demos recorded they had enough for 3 records. Rachel pulled out what she wanted to keep for completing her second solo record and put to the side. ￼ The idea of the album generated buzz within the band and they went to work recording in Archie's home studio "The Sandbox". The band also decided to start working with management to tour overseas and then come back home and work on the album and then maybe head back out on tour. The band brought in Randy Mason, James Edgewood, Allen Powhaten, and Johnny Natchez to help work on the record even though they are only signed as contract players and touring musicians. Keith Hudson was initially intrigued by the concept of the record and the idea of writing new material. He presented about 10 tracks to the project but only four were finally used on the release.
The band consulted Engineer Bob Zanka to produce the album. He told them to ask themselves if the tracks represented their best work. Rachel said that they "couldn't honestly look at ourselves and say, 'That was the best thing we've ever done.' So we decided to move on and do something completely new." They agreed and spent the next three weeks writing new material.
== Composition[edit] ==
=== Music[edit] ===
Speaking on the album's musical content, Rachel remarked, "For us, So Deadly My Dear is about taking those classic rock and roll elements, kicking out the rules, putting more ambition in, and making it current." Part of recording the album was attempting to expand their familiar alternative pop rock sound by experimenting with different styles such as new wave, Latin, and polka music. The band listened to various rock operas, including the Who's Tommy (1969) and David Bowie's The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars (1972). Archie was particularly inspired by the Who's Quadrophenia, finding more in common with its "power chord mod-pop aesthetic" than other concept records, such as The Wall by Pink Floyd. In addition, they listened to the cast recordings of Broadway musicals West Side Story, The Rocky Horror Show, Grease, and Jesus Christ Superstar, and they let contemporary music influence them, including rappers as well as other rock bands. Archie considered rock music at this point a very "conservative" business with regard to the rigidity in which a band must release a single, create a music video, or head out on tour. He felt groups and hip hop artists were "kicking rock's ass, because there's so much ambition."
The band used more loud guitar sounds for the record. Archie said "We were like, 'Let's just go balls-out on the guitar sound—plug in the Les Pauls and Marshalls and let it rip'". Archie added tracks of acoustic guitar-playing throughout the record to augment his electric guitar rhythms and Keith and Allen's drumming.
For most of the record, Randy Mason used an Ampeg SVT bass amplifier, recording with his signature Fender Precision Bass. For the album, he and Zanka strived for a "solid, big, thunderous" bass sound as opposed to one centered on countermelodies. He ran his bass guitar through an Evil Twin direct box, a staple of his recording methods since the early . Hudson also employs unorthodox instruments for punk music—timpani, glockenspiel, and hammer bells—which he received out of a promotional deal with Ludwig. These instruments are especially evident throughout the album/ the album also includes an African bead gourd that was welded to a remote hi-hat pedal for future live performances. Hudson and Powhaten recorded drums in a room designed to record guitars to achieve a dry sound. With all these techniques and influences considered, critics have called the album pop-punk and alternative rock, but primarily the aforementioned alt pop rock.
Bob Zanka wanted the band to go back to sounding like a live band through the recordings and worked diligently to engineer and master this through out the recordings. ￼
=== Lyrics[edit] ===
The plot of So Deadly My Dearcenters around anti-hero and main character Sasha Deadly, who is a famous rock musician but also an undercover agent fighting to bring the world back to peace and harmony and unite the current division that the antagonist has caused through chaos of worldly events orchestrated to bring this division. Led by an man in the background who is the mystery antagonist known only as the "RED FACED MAN"
Through the story, Archie and Rachel hoped to detail coming of age in America at the time of the album's release. He had felt the desire to increase the amount of political content in his lyricism as he grew into adulthood, noting that the "climate" surrounding his aging produced feelings of responsibility in the songs he wrote. Rachel said, "As soon as you abandon the verse-chorus-verse-chorus-bridge song structure ... it opens up your mind to this different way of writing, where there really are no rules." In addition to the album's political content, it also touches on interpersonal relationships and what Anziotti labeled "confusion and loss of individuality."
"So Deadly You Dear" contends that mass media has orchestrated paranoia and idiocy among the public, particularly cable news, which Archie felt had crossed the line from journalism to reality television, only showcasing violent footage intercut with advertisements. The song emphasizes strong language, to create what he imagined would be a voice for the disenfranchised. 
While the content is clearly of the times, Rachel and Archie hoped it would remain timeless and become more an overarching statement on confusion.
Archie expressed dismay at the then-upcoming presidential election. He felt confused by the country's culture war, noting the particular division among the general public. Summing up his feelings he felt that at the time of the 9/11 attacks there was this commitment to unity instead of division and now 20 plus years later we are further divided than we have ever been as a country and a people. Rachel noted divisions between America's youth and all any one seemed to are about was tik tok or trends.
The album is part one of a two part story that was recorded at the same time with the second album completing the second part of the story.
== Synopsis[edit] ==
=== Album I[edit] ===
The album opens to Sasha, a troubled young woman who has uncovered a world plot to divide and separate people through hate and chaos. It is then revealed she is a double agent working for both the people representing the RED FACED MAN and the underground rebellion known as the LIGHT Brigade. She is captured after her live performance and tortured to change her conditioning to begins a new as a girl named Victoria Fierce. She learns that her partner was murdered, and that she was Victoria in a past life. She begins to believe that Victoria is haunting her to reveal the truth about her murder. She meets a record producer named Albert Folley who wants to produce her next album which is all a ruse to get her out of the mind hypnotic they have her under. The resistance helps her to California and there they began reconditioning her to get her mind back. Fearing that they wont be able to convert her back they set up a plot to insert her to assissinate a second in command to The RED FACED MAN known only as Nicolai and by the end of the album Sasha is believed to be killed and the rebellion Stopped.
== Track listing[edit] ==
All lyrics are attributed to written by Keith Hudson, Archie Monroe, Rachel Monroe, Ed Anziotti except "Secret Rendevous", by R. Monroe and Ed Anziotti ; all music is composed by Archie Monroe, Rachel Monroe, Keith Hudson, Ed Anziotti except "Only Want to Roll You Down" which is also composed by Allen Powhaten and Johnny Natchez.
Side one
No.	Title 	Length
1. 	Paint the Town 	4:51
2. 	Boom Boom Pow Pow 	4:34
3. 	So Deadly My Dear 	3:49
4. 	Aios (Just let it Go) 	3:51
5 	Love in California 	5:37
6 	Santa Monica Girl (Fire Version)	4:01
7 	How do I Find You 	4:53
8 	Only Want to Roll You Down 	5:16
Side two
No.	Title 	Length
9. 	S.O.S. 	4:25
10.	Better to be Alone 	5:45
11.	Temptation 	3:58
12 	Secret Rendevous 	4:09
13 	Anthem 	3:42
14 	I Got It 	3:48
15 	Give me Dem Bones 	3:32
16 	No Average Girl 	5:33
17 	Fight the Fiends 	4:41
18 	She ain't got nothing	2:26
19 	Save another one 	3:07
20 	Rhythm Rhapsody 	4:00
21 	Meaningless Kiss 	4:51
22 	Rapturous 	4:22
== Personnel[edit] ==
The New Romantic Devils
Archie Monroe- 6- and 12-string electric and acoustic guitar, Lead Guitar
Keith Hudson- Drums, timbales, gong, orchestra bells, glockenspiel, wind chimes, bell tree, crotales, cowbell, plywood
Rachel Monroe- Lead Vocals and Piano, and acoustic guitar
Johnny Natchez- Rhythm guitar, drums and vocals
Ed Anziotti- Lead and Rhythm guitar
James Edgewood- bass guitars, keyboards, bass pedals, vocals
Allen Powhaten- Drums and Vocals
Production*Bob Zanka – production, arrangements
* Bob Zanka – Mastering and engineering
* Keith Hudson– assistant engineering
* Archie Monroe-assistant engineering
* Charlie Simmons – art direction, graphics, cover concept
== Chart positions[edit] ==
=== Weekly charts[edit] ===
{| class="sortable fandom-table"	Chart (2023)	Peak
position
Australian Albums (Kent Music Report)	4 	
Canadian Albums (RPM) 	1 	
German Albums (Offizielle Top 100) 	37 	
Japanese Albums (Oricon) 	24 	
New Zealand Albums (RMNZ) 	8 	
Norwegian Albums (VG-lista) 	21 	
United States Albums (Billboard) 	4 	
Swedish Albums (Sverigetopplistan) 	33 	
== Certifications[edit] ==
Sales certifications for Drive
Region 	Certification 	Certified units/sales
Australia (ARIA) 	Platinum 	50,000^
Canada (Music Canada) 	Platinum 	100,000^
United States 	— 	7.337.000
United Kingdom (BPI) 	Silver 	60,000^
^ Shipments figures based on certification alone.	^ Shipments figures based on certification alone.	^ Shipments figures based on certification alone.