The melodious grunge of the Foo Fighters' debut record stopped me in my tracks the first time I heard it. It was an album you could put on and immediately fall in love with. The songs were soft-pop coated in distortion. Everything was intense, catchy and fun.

Somehow, The Colour and the Shape sounds like an unplanned theft of the first record's style. It's louder and more intense than the debut and the songs, three or four tracks aside, have lost their pop appeal. All 13 tracks sound stunningly similar, and for a second there, "Hey, Johnny Park!" had me thinking I'd subconsciously thrown in a Goo Goo Dolls disc while I was off in another world, trying to tune out those not- so- glorious sounds of yesteryear.

Yeah, there are a couple of decent songs among the pack. "Monkey Wrench," for one, isn't that awful and songs like "Up In Arms" and the truly awesome "Everlong" wouldn't have sounded out of place on Foo Fighters. It's songs like the opening track, "Doll," and "Wind Up" that bring me down. How could a band so great go downhill so quickly?

Shape is a major disappointment for every fan who wanted more of the same from some guys who could genuinely pull it off. Maybe it's just me, but Dave Grohl's music seems to have faded with the times. It's like opening a time capsule from 1992 and realizing that what you thought would be an awesome discovery turned out to be just plain out of style.

-Ryan Schreiber