A shopping directory, catalogue nods and security cameras are waiting inside. An explanation is still forthcoming.
Fall Out Boy have turned their website into Twilight Town Mall, expanding a cryptic teaser campaign into a shopping-centre directory with an arcade, a photography studio and its own security page.
The official site invites fans to explore beneath a lurid green moon and blue storefront logo. Its directory includes Two Quarters Arcade, Ace’s Hifi and Flash Flash Flash Photography Studio.
There is even a food court. The events calendar is less forthcoming.
Click through to Events and the only announcement is “Coming Soon”. The pages currently available do not identify a new album, single or release date.
The shopping-centre setting gives some context to the videos that preceded it. According to NewsNation’s report, republished by AOL, those clips showed Patrick Stump browsing records, Joe Trohman handling digital cameras and Andy Hurley trying a claw machine. Pete Wentz, meanwhile, was upholstering a casket.
The records, cameras and arcade game now have obvious counterparts in the mall directory. What they are building towards remains unresolved.
A Little Less Spending
Some of the storefront names reward a closer look. Lake Effect Kids Toys appears to nod to ‘Lake Effect Kid’, the song Fall Out Boy officially released in 2018. That is a catalogue connection, rather than evidence of a particular reissue or anniversary project.
The Offers page makes its reference more explicit: “A Little Less Spending, A Little More Savings”. It gives ‘A Little Less Sixteen Candles, A Little More “Touch Me”’ the retail treatment, alongside a rewards-program signup promising exclusive offers and surprises.
Over on Security, four camera panels are labelled for the main atrium, lower level, food court and parking-lot entrance. The band have supplied the shopping-centre infrastructure before explaining what anyone is shopping for.
The campaign had attracted attention by 31 October, when Kerrang! reported a mall-themed social graphic, a changed Instagram logo and a website directing fans to a mailing list.
Fall Out Boy have form with a drawn-out reveal. As BLUNT reported in January 2023, a cryptic campaign preceded the announcement of their eighth album, So Much (For) Stardust, and lead single ‘Love From The Other Side’.
That history gives fans a reason to keep looking. For now, the mall’s events page is the place to watch for something more definite than a rewards scheme.
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