The Unauthorized Biography of Reinhold Messner is the third studio album by Ben Folds Five, released April 27, 1999. It represented a departure for the band from their usual pop-rock sound to material influenced by classical and chamber music, with darker, introspective lyrics on subjects such as regret, death, and loss of innocence. It was the final full-length album from the trio until the release of The Sound of the Life of the Mind in 2012. It was produced by Caleb Southern. Background Title origin The title of the album refers to a name used by the band's drummer Darren Jessee and his friends on fake IDs as teenagers. The band was unaware of the existence of the real Reinhold Messner, the first man to climb Mount Everest solo, and the first to do so without the aid of bottled oxygen, until work on the album had already progressed. They were informed of his existence in 1999 during an interview with DJ Bruce Warren of WXPN radio. In the record's liner notes, Messner is thanked for his understanding and cooperation. Writing and recording The writing style of the album has been described by the band as a reactionary process, a result of the fatigue from playing in a bombastic rock band. Bassist Robert Sledge stated in an interview with Front to Back that this fatigue naturally led to the band playing lighter material. Lead singer and songwriter Ben Folds recalls being "tired of writing pop songs" and it led to changes in his writing style. As the new material was being written, Folds was "really into" chord progressions and voice leadings that he says kept finding their way into what he was writing. Naturally, the original demo for the album did not have traditional songs, but rather was one long track containing all the musical ideas as a cohesive narrative. After some concerns from the label, Folds says, "everyone took me out to lunch and asked me to split it up into separate songs instead of being one, and I remember Caleb saying – kind of implying that we were sort of in trouble pretty soon because nobody was hearing anything that sounded like real songs on the record." The album was recorded in a three-month span. Unlike its predecessor, Whatever and Ever Amen, which was recorded at Folds's house in Chapel Hill, Reinhold Messner was recorded at several recording