Seen This One Before, the Girl Gets Away

The Fray are basically a band for those that want to get into Coldplay but in the end find them too artsy. That made it appropriate that the band got its big break by being placed in an episode of Grey’s Anatomy, a television show for women who would like to get into daytime soap operas, but find them to wordy.

There are no deviations on The Fray’s self-titled sophomore album from their debut. Lead singer Isaac Slade is still doing his best Chris Martin impersonation on the ivories while his band follows along with paint by numbers accompaniment. The lyrics are still geared toward relationships, be it friends family or that significant other.

But much like their big hit off the first album, How to Save a Life, when everything comes together, they can still deliver an emotional punch much like on the first single You Found Me that finds the band talking to a chain smoking deity on a street corner.

But much like the first album, when they cannot muster up enough to land a punch, it can be pretty sleep inducing like Ungodly Hour which should go into heavy rotation at any sleep inducing clinics. And when the band finally tries to change the mid-tempo, heart-bleeding template from their debut, like near the end of The Fray with the straight ahead rocker of We Build Then We Break, it just seems forced.

Coldplay were able to break their own mold with their forth album, hopefully The Fray can do that next time out with their third.

Song to Download - You Found Me

The Fray gets a on my Terror Alert Scale.