CD Review: Switchfoot's Oh! Gravity

For the band’s new effort, Oh! Gravity, Switchfoot brings back much of the same passion that made 2003’s The Beautiful Letdown so effective. If you remember that far back, we had “Meant to Live” commanding the radio airwaves—a song that not only asked that there be more to life, but exclaimed to the world that there already was.

The San Diego-based alternative rockers have distinct Christian roots, which was made evident in their first three records; they even received a Grammy nomination for best rock gospel in 2002 for Learning To Breathe.

However, in recent years, the quintet has omitted the J-word from its lyrics in favor of mainstream appeal. Hey, things like passion and inspiration have to come from somewhere and, thankfully, these musicians have more than enough of both to go around.

For the new album, Switchfoot has stated its disillusionment with the modern world, with every track offering its own repudiation of materialism, greed and excess. Much of the new tunes have edgier and more direct tones than what we’ve heard before. It’s not direct in a hostile or aggressive way, but rather in a more philosophically compelling way. The result brings us one of the more quotable albums of the year.

Some of the more anti-materialist lyrics on Oh! Gravity come from the enticing track “American Dream,” with it’s echoing chorus, “this aint my American Dream/I want to live and die for better things/I’m tired of fighting just for me/this aint my American dream/ I want out of this machine/It doesn’t feel like freedom.” The theme continues through the song “4:12,” with the lyrics,”Waiting tables and parking cars/You’ve been selling cell phones at the shopping mall/And you began to believe that all you are is material/It’s nonsensical.”

The rockers’ spiritual musings never cease throughout the record. For some bands this can spell disaster (sorry, Evanescence), but not for these boys and not on this record. In “Awakening,” the lyrics note that manmade things are not enough to satisfy the soul: “man made never made our dreams collide/I want to live like I know what I’m leaving/I want to know that my heart’s still beating.” The group’s methodic guitar riffs brewed with inclusive lyrics and the sensual vocals of Jon Foreman is Switchfoot’s very soul.

I would say that the two songs with the most religious overtones are “Faust, Midas, and Myself” and “Head Over Heals.” The former is a modern-day account of the biblical tale where Satan offers the J-Man the whole world, just as long as he worships him instead of God. As for the latter, let’s just say it almost had me praising the sky in a drooling, moonstruck state. The ballad “Yesterdays,” on the other hand, is a serene and emotional take on the death of a loved one that anybody can relate to, and it nearly brought tears to my modest eyes.

Heart is the key element that drives Switchfoot. It’s rare that we find a prominent rock act that’s full of love and hope, rather than rage, depression and apathy. Sure, these guys can be good role models for the kiddies, but their material is deep enough to satisfy the hunger for substance within us adults.

Not that it's all perfect: The poppy and mindless track “Amateur Lovers” feels direly out of place. But overall, Oh! Gravity is a solid rock/pop album—something almost any demographic of rock fans can take something from.

Switchfoot yet again offers some inspirational tracks, asking us to find meaning in our lives, to live better lives and to be better people. Whether we do it simply for ourselves, for our families, for our friends or for God is really every individual’s prerogative. But the point is that we have these goals in our minds and that we try. If it takes an alternative rock band from California to remind us of that every now and again, then so be it.