Let's get this out of the way: I liked A Static Lullaby's And Don't Forget To Breathe. I liked it a lot. It doesn't get much play around these parts nowadays, but when it was first released two years ago, it came across to me as a much more intense, refreshing approach to the screaming trend, for lack of a better analogy, a trend of which was only beginning to pick up momentum at the time. So perhaps there's a little more ground in that sense in saying that Faso Latido, the band's major label debut, is a flat-out aural punishment.

A Static Lullaby has served up a carefully manipulated 51 minutes of boring, vaguely stoner-influenced radio rock with terrible songwriting and awkward pushes for arena choruses. While it's obvious the band can make a memorable, singable part here and there, it's constantly underminded by overproduction and/or cringe-worthy lyrics ("Do you / want to feel / like the knife is in you? [like the knife is in you!]"). It's never a positive when an album comes across as unintentionally funny, but it's just the case with Faso Latido.

Singer/screamer Joe Brown has been essentially relegated to backup duty; his formerly trademarked screams are scarce here, as the album depends much more on the clean singing from other members. When he does try and put his two cents into a song, it's basically demoted to background filler, sounding like a mostly pointless addition to the otherwise more accessible sound the band manages to achieve. Lead single "Stand Up" is a perfect example; it showcases a new, upbeat mood to the band with a nice, catchy guitar melody and Brown yelling parenthized footnotes to the verses, which never actually make that much sense ("As we walk these streets are bleeding!"). While the band actually sounding happy isn't necessarily a bad thing, their disappointingly cheesy chorus is.

The second track, "Smooth Modulator," is a fairly decent treatment of the new sound with mildly interesting percussion and on-off vocal pacing, but there isn't much to take notice of afterwards. Faso Latido marches forth with boring track after dull moment from that point on, with little to note and barely a second worth the effort to pay attention. A Static Lullaby has been completely defanged of their once aggressive, interesting nature. The band was never quite this chaotic monster of musical creativity and ambition, but they used to hide it somewhat well; Faso Latido is the band's exposition of reality, though.

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