Thrash Unreal
Thrash Unreal is a song by Against Me! from their 2007 album New Wave. It was released as the album’s second single on October 10, 2007. The track is 4 minutes 14 seconds long, is a punk rock song written by Laura Jane Grace, produced by Butch Vig, and released on Sire Records. It became the band’s first song to chart in the United States, reaching number 11 on Billboard’s Alternative Songs chart.
The title was coined by producer Butch Vig. Grace said Vig encouraged her to write something in the spirit of Lou Reed’s Walk on the Wild Side. The lyrics are fictional; the “she” in the song is a composite of people Grace has met. A friend thought the song was about her, which hurt, and she died in 2009. Grace later promised to write a new song about her, which became Because of the Shame on 2010’s White Crosses. A line in the song nods to Billy Idol’s Rebel Yell.
Alternative Press named Thrash Unreal the third-best Against Me! song, and Spin placed it at No. 20 on its list of The 21 Best Pop-Punk Choruses of the 21st Century.
Formats and video: A 7" single was released on July 10, 2007 as a pre-order bonus for New Wave, pressed on black (6,500 copies) and red (500 copies) vinyl. The CD single came out in October 2007 and includes a different second track from the vinyl. The song was also released as a downloadable track for Rock Band on March 17, 2009.
Music video: The original concept would have had Grace dressed as a woman, but the label rejected it. The final video shows a distressed girl at a party upstairs while the band plays in the basement; wine and plaster spill onto the band as chaos erupts, and the girl eventually stomps the floor and breaks through to the basement, where she finds the band and the room ends up empty.
This page was last edited on 2 February 2026, at 14:39 (CET).