Five Score and Seven Years Ago is the fifth studio album by Christian rock band Relient K. It was released on March 6, 2007, and is the first full-length album by the band to feature bassist John Warne (replacing founding member Brian Pittman) and guitarist Jon Schneck. Furthermore, it would serve as drummer Dave Douglas' last album with the band until Air for Free (2016). Future drummer Ethan Luck makes his debut on the track "Deathbed".
Production
Due to being signed with Capitol Records, the band was given the blessing of a pre-production period for the first time. Guitarist Matt Hoopes stated that this was a good thing, citing how the band members no longer all lived in Ohio.
While posting on the band and the recording process, a fan on CMCentral.com said, "They recorded for a couple weeks in LA with Howard Benson. This is the first time Relient K will use a different producer, as Mark Lee Townsend has recorded everything they've released up to this point. (Matt Thiessen has co-produced on a few things). They finished the album with Townsend at his studio."
The band's long-time producer Mark Lee Townsend also spoke of the album being recorded on his site. He produced the first track and the last track of the album, as well as "Crayons Can Melt On Us For All I Care". In one of his blogs, he said, "It was a great day in the studio with Relient K today. We've been working on a song for the record that is a bit of an epic in many ways with a ton of tracks and instruments. It's going to be pretty special when it all gets recorded and mixed. We are almost done with lead vocals on it and will be putting live strings on it next week, along with a few other parts that are a bit unconventional to pop punk. I'll keep you posted. The weather has been spectacular this last week and it's great for shooting hoops on breaks from the studio. Based on what I have heard from the tracks in L.A. and what we are doing here, the new album will be amazing."
Townsend also said later, "It's been a great week back in the studio with Relient K. We are working on a few album cuts and some additional acoustic versions of songs on the record. This week we got drums and bass done on the songs and will spend the next couple weeks filling out the rest of the songs. Matt is still finishing up some of the writing on a ballad we've been assembling and it's going to be an amazing track when we get done. It's one of those tracks where you just start putting it together, and it's very bare bones right now, but you know it's going to turn out really special. I heard a couple of the test mixes on some of the songs done in LA and it sounds fantastic and 'famous' IMHO."
Townsend also spoke of the epic track that he and Matt Thiessen were working on at that point, which was a cover of a popular Christmas song by James Krader. The song turned out to be "Deathbed". Townsend said, "Well, the Relient K album is pretty much done at this point. It's a fantastic piece of music from top to bottom and I'm sure the fans will love it. I'm sure they will have something posted on their MySpace or website with details and a bit of music. Poor Matt T had to work his butt off with me the last week as we added a bunch of instruments to the 11 minute epic we were working on. Matt dusted off his horn playing skills from high school and played trumpet, trombone, french horn, and baritone on the song. We clocked in at 115 tracks including live strings, horns, a bunch of mellotron stuff, 3 different drum kits, ukulele, sleigh bells, micromoog and more. We had fun working on the track with all the instruments, but it was a lot of work and I think we are all glad that it is done. JR McNeely mixed it over a couple of days and it sounds amazing. I think we all are stoked about it."
Title and cover art
According to lead singer, Matt Thiessen, the album was created with a "Five" theme, as it is the band's fifth album, and for the first time Relient K has five members on an album. The "Seven Years Ago" links with the fact that the group's first album was created seven years prior to the release of this album, making for five albums in seven years. It also ties in with the famous line, "Four score and seven years ago", delivered by Abraham Lincoln in the Gettysburg Address. Lincoln is addressed in the first track, "Plead the Fifth". A poster advertising a concert for the band around the album's release depicted a cartoon Abraham Lincoln on it as well.