The Downfall, Transporter

I’m running out of space on the iPod. Therefore, I rarely put new music on it these days; for your band to get a coveted piece of my remaining 200 MB, you’d better impress me enough to click that “Import CD” button. I was ripping Transporter, however, by the third song, mainly due to The Downfall’s no-nonsense approach to loud, bombastic rock. Hints of the Foo Fighters (“Yourself and No One Else”), Shades Apart (“Domeshi Guri,” “The Obvious Absence”), The Revolution Smile (“Sorry Situation”), and even Silverchair (“Undone”) are all evoked at various times throughout the album — not a bad group of touchstones to draw from, in my opinion. The Downfall delivers melodic vocals that venture into screaming territory once in a while, propulsive drumming, nice low end, and lots of thick guitar riffs. I was also very impressed at the album’s production — these days, more often than not, power-trios that play loud rock come off pretty flat. The chunks and bombast of the guitar tend to get buried in the mix, or you lose the power of the drums. Not the case with Transporter. This is an album that you won’t have to crank up too loud to fully enjoy — although you may want to anyway.