Switchfoot The Beautiful Letdown label: Red Ink released: 02.25.03 our score: 4.0 out of 5.0

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For the past year Switchfoot has been gaining a strong fan base. Their fourth album and major-label debut The Beautiful Letdown has launched Switchfoot into the mainstream gaining fans like a wave gathers strength. Fueled by the lead single "Meant to Live," which was inspired by t.s. eliot's poem "The Hollow Men," Switchfoot, a surfing term, has become Christian music's newest crossover product.

This album is full of thought-provoking songs, such as, "This Is Your Life," which is lyrically reminiscent of Green Day's "Good Riddance (Time Of Your Life)." Every time the chorus came around, ("This is your life/ Are you who you want to be?), I kept picturing the Green Day video with slow-motion shots of normal people working menial jobs or pumping gas. Switchfoot forces the listener to think about their own life and answer that question for himself/herself. This is what good songwriting is all about.

The best song on the album is "Dare You To Move," a wonderful power ballad (yes, I said wonderful power ballad) about, I'm guessing here, the second coming of Christ. The verses quietly welcome Christ to earth (without saying His name) and by the end of the song they forcefully "dare you to move / like today never happened."

There are a couple of clunkers here, namely the borefest "More Than Fine" with the uninspired chorus "More than fine/ More than just OK." And the generic "Ammunition."

The Beautiful Letdown overall is a little generic, but it is so catchy and (for the most part) well-written that I couldn't help but like it. The more spins this album is given, the better it gets. Letdown? Not even close.
12-Aug-2002 9:04 AM

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