Their first proper album since the world's biggest punk-pop band dominated the charts and awards shows with 2004's American Idiot sounds … a lot like American Idiot, only with more piano. Tunes like the anthemic, rhythm-shifting title track, sing-along single “Know Your Enemy,” the show tune-dynamic “Before The Lobotomy” and, well, pretty much everything else (excepting, perhaps, the mix of old and new that is “Christian's Inferno”) sounds like it came out of the same sessions that produced the previous Green Day release. They wouldn't have been cut for lack of quality; Breakdown is every bit as cohesive, catchy and accomplished a suite of songs. But coming from a band that really achieved iconic status not by perfecting the three-chords-and-a-ton-of-hooky-energy formula, but by walking away from that distinction and going on to consistently reinvent itself, such a safe next move, however enjoyable, comes off as something of a disappointment. - Scott Harrell