Daryl Tay.net

When The World Comes Down

Three years after their last studio album, Swing Swing, The All-American Rejects are back after far too long with their new album, When The World Comes Down. Listened to as a whole, the album is as packaged as they come. Almost like Simple Plan’s albums. You have the standard angst song, a love ballad, a breakup song and more of the formulaic method on how to make an album. When it comes to a mainstream pop band like the All-American Rejects, this isn’t necessarily a bad thing.

The album still has great tracks like Gives You Hell (which has an amusing music video to accompany it), I Wanna (a catchy tune in the vein of I Wanna Hold Your Hand by The Beatles), Back To Me, and my favourite track off the album, Another Heart Calls. That said, even though these are the notable songs, a lot of the album meshes together with similar styles and I had a hard time remembering which song was which if I wasn’t paying attention while listening.

Unlike bands that have tried to over-experiment like The Ataris, The All-American Rejects have produced another album with the same melodious music that is unmistakably by them, and if you can overlook the fact that some tracks aren’t all that distinctive, overall it’s a passable effort from a band that has been away for far too long.