The Fully Down – Don't Get Lost in a Movement Review

Link: The Fully Down home page.

The Inside Pulse: Yet another band emerges into the still-thriving power-punk-pop-emo-whatever genre. Canadian band The Fully Down tries to make a splash onto the increasingly crowded scene with Don’t Get Lost in a Movement, their second album released on the heels of their debut, No Fate…But What We Make for Ourselves.

Positives: The Fully Down does manage to separate themselves somewhat from the pack with their musicianship. Employing a unique three-guitar attack, The Fully Down are able to create some fairly impressive sonic backdrops that most bands in the genre can’t come close to competing with. Listen to the guitar work on songs like “Plug In The Eliminator” and “Life In Motion” and you can see that these guys are a cut above most other punk-pop bands instrumentally.

Negatives: Their lyrics, however, are the same stock stuff spouted by other punk/emo bands like Taking Back Sunday, Good Charlotte, Yellowcard, et.al. Stuff like “If you don’t stand for what you want/It won’t be this good/You won’t feel alive/You’ll be barely there/Barely breathing” sounds like something a teenager would scribble in their spiral notebook during lunch break. Which, considering these guys are all in their late teens/early 20’s, isn’t too surprising. And their song titles are the height of pretentiousness. Titles such as “Descent, Rebellion, And All Around Hell Raising”, “Revenge Is Profitable, Gratitude Is Expensive”, and “Go To Heaven For The Climate, Hell For The Company” are a blatant attempt to suggest a depth to their songs that just doesn’t exist. For a band that’s so solid with their musicianship, it’s a bit of a letdown that their lyrics are so stunted and immature.

Cross-breed: Taking Back Sunday with Yellowcard with Good Charlotte with Dashboard Confessional, but the guitar attack of early Radiohead.

Reason to buy: If you’re absolutely dead set on buying a punk-pop CD, this band’s the best of the bunch.