Anberlin - Cities

I believe I've driven my argument about the general staleness of pop punk into the ground and poked it out the other side. I like pop punk in theory, but there are so many bands out there treading on the same threadbare piece of carpet that it's hard to really feel like anyone in the genre is really going anywhere. Anberlin is great because they are not the same old four chord sound churned out in the same predictable ways. They have layers of complexity in their music, and their lead singer doesn't sound like the lead singer from New Found Glory (90% of pop punk bands have a singer who is completely indistinguishable from NFG's).

Cities, while not quite my favorite Anberlin album (that would be Blueprints for the Black Market) is quite impressive. I was especially impressed by the deluxe version of the album which includes a couple 80's covers (The Smiths "There is a Light That Never Goes Out" and When in Rome's "The Promise." The cover of "The Promise" is particularly excellent). The album boasts a number of tightly constructed songs, but my favorites are "Godspeed," "Adelaide," and "Inevitable."

Baleeted? Nope. Too many good things happening here.