Artist: Switchfoot
Album: Nothing Is Sound
Label: Columbia Records
Tracks: 12
Length: 51:10
Review By: Jacob Gehman

When I was little, my mom worked in a Christian bookstore. That meant that I was allowed little privileges the kids at my church weren’t privy to. For instance, the music buyer would get pre-releases of albums and my mom would nab some of them for me. Or, on a really good day I might be allowed to enter the buyer’s office and select some things on my own from a certain shelf. One of the little treasures I came away with one day was a pre-release cassette of Switchfoot’s first album, “The Legend of Chin.” It was the majority of the album, sans two songs, and the whole album had yet to release to the rest of the world.

I drank it up like frat punks consume beer at a party. It was a fairly liberating album for me, but it wasn’t too long after that I got a cd player and my cassettes fell by the wayside. It took me many, many years to finally get the whole album, but when I did (after “The Beautiful Letdown” released) I wondered now I had survived without it for so long.

“The Beautiful Letdown” has been Switchfoot’s commercial success. Despite three really good albums that released prior to that, to critical praise and a small band of CCM fans not totally enamored with dc Talk, the Newsboys, or Five Iron Frenzy who appreciate good alternative rock. But radio success often dictates the beginning for a band, and “The Beautiful Letdown” was all that and more for Switchfoot. So it is not completely ignorant for the rest of the world to subconsciously view “Nothing Is Sound” as a sophomore album of sorts.

In a way it is. Just like there is a pre-“Silence” Blindside and post-“Silence” Blindside there can now be considered a pre and post-“The Beautiful Letdown” Switchfoot. Eighty percent of Switchfoot’s fan base became familiar with and started loving the band with “The Beautiful Letdown” so it would make sense, both financially and otherwise, for them to continue in that same vein. Switchfoot had been consistently evolving from the beginning up to the album that defined them and now “Nothing Is Sound” feels a lot like someone hit the repeat button. Running “The Beautiful Letdown” and “Nothing Is Sound” back to back on an iPod would feel like it was just one long, continuous album.

I was a fan of “The Beautiful Letdown” at first. The first couple of listens were pretty good. But the album became fairly wearisome after a while. Which is where “Nothing Is Sound” differentiates it’s self from it’s predecessor. Here the first listen was fairly mediocre, but every spin after that has unveiled new nooks and crannies to the songs that reveal them to be better composed and executed than those on “The Beautiful Letdown.” Little sprinkles of piano or a subtle chorus liven up songs on close listens, which makes this album better despite the similarities.

The new fans who hopped on the Switchfoot boat with “The Beautiful Letdown” will find the new album to be a great “sophomore” album and will not be disappointed with their purchase. Those who enjoyed “The Beautiful Letdown” as just a stepping stone to bigger and better things may be disappointed though will probably find multiple listens yield tasty tidbits. Those who weren’t fans before won’t change their mind now.