4 / 10

Jimmy Eat World’s sudden rise to fame is the kind of story that both the music industry and the press love.

Essentially, four remarkably average looking guys from Arizona caught lightning in a bottle with a catchy single that promised its listeners, “Everything, everything will be all right, all right.”

But since “The Middle” became a radio and movie trailer staple in 2001, the band has yet to recapture the magic found in their much-loved 1999 album “Clarity” or their pop-rock hits from the early decade.

If their fifth album, “Chase the Light” is any indication, there is still a long way to go before that magic is rediscovered.

Jimmy Eat World’s best songs combine big, arena-sized rock sound with angst, earnestness and most importantly, big, catchy hooks that stay in your head for weeks.

Unfortunately, most of the songs fail to live up in the catchiness department.
Instead, they sound unimaginative. By the end of the record, each song becomes boring on a good day, annoying on a bad day and formulaic everyday.

One thing Jimmy Eat World can’t be faulted with is a lack of sincerity, but in the years since “Clarity,” the group hasn’t come up with a compelling way to mature.

The closest they come is during the bridge of the album’s moody centerpiece, “Gotta Be Somebody’s Blues.” The string arrangement changes its pace and layers melodies together into something interesting.

Unfortunately, that moment is too short and the strings go back to being wallpaper for a hook-less ballad.

The band gets a little closer to reclaiming their glory with the brief and breezy rocker “Feeling Lucky,” as well as the disco-infused “Here it Goes,” but much of the record is still cheesy and banal.

The track “Big Casino” doesn’t even produce a chorus catchy enough to hum. It’s amazing they managed to cram such clumsy prose into a melody in the first place.

With production help from Butch Vig, the man who produced Nirvana’s “Nevermind,” “Chase the Light” sounds like any number of arena-rock bands that are overplayed on the radio.

But what the production can’t take care of is the songs, which lack distinction, making Jimmy Eat World sound mediocre at best.

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