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The inevitable ‘new direction’ disease has spread to Florida pop-punkers New Found Glory with a critical result. Their fifth studio album has shed their signature fast and furious riffs and contagiously catchy choruses for a more ‘mature and reflective’ sound. The result - a wet collection of middle of the road songs that sound like ‘The Starting Line’ after they’ve had their pants pulled down and their dinner money swiped. Lead singer, Jordan Pundik recently boasted that ‘Coming Home’ will be “the one that will stand the test of time” but on this showing it should be hidden away like sodden sheets - everyone knows it happened, but nobody wants to talk about it.
NFG’s past successes have been based on slick high-tempo songs bursting with energy and passion with tunes like ‘My Friends Over You’ and ‘Hit or Miss’ firmly lodged in pop-punk’s hall of fame. Their lyrics have never been the most original but with the new stripped down sound the words suddenly take greater prominence. Writing about girls for five albums has obviously left the boys scraping the lyrical barrel as on ‘Hold My Hand’ Pundik sings "Doo doo doo doo doo doo, you’ll never know I’m after you" followed by "You smell like how angels ought to smell". As in the past they might have been able to get away with it due to a crunching riff here or an infectious harmony there, this time it stands out like a nun in a brothel.
Previous album 2004’s ‘Catalyst’ had the mix of fast and slow just about right with storming tunes like ‘All Downhill From Here’ and ‘Failure’s Not Flattering’ spearheading the album while more reflective songs like ‘Ending In Tragedy’ and ‘Over The Head, Below The Knees’ added an extra dimension. Pundik explained “Usually with every record we think, ‘we’ve got to put the fast punk song on or people won’t like it’ but this wasn’t anything like that”. Maybe the quartet should have listened to the ‘people’ as when you remove what you’re famous for and how you acquired your fan base you have to replace it with something seriously special, but unfortunately ‘Coming Home’ is well and truly stuck in mediocreville.
‘Coming Home’ does have some good moments however, with the verses on ‘Hold my hand’ being slick and very catchy while the stand out track is the beautiful ‘Too Good To Be’ where Pundik is only accompanied by an acoustic guitar and the most sophisticated lyrics of the LP. Another plus is Pundik’s voice being the most mature its ever sounded, finally he has cut his helium dosage and stopped singing through his nose. Pop-punk’s new upstarts Fall Out Boy have obviously made an impression on NFG but their attempts at emulating the Chicago four-piece’s signature ‘uho uho’s’ on their title track ‘Coming Home’ fall way short and wouldn’t even make a FOB B-side.
NFG fans are surely going to be divided by this offering, but all will be united in the feeling of emptiness after listening to 15 songs without a single fast pogo inducing tune. There is always room for change and experimentation but this collection lacks the heart and passion of their previous offerings. Put it simply if this was their debut album they would struggle to amass the same amount of dedicated fans.
