since i'm so broken down, why don't you fix me?

Audioslave's third studio release, Revelations, comes just a year after their sophomore album. Out of Exile was a mediocre effort; it had some strong tracks on it but for every good song there were two that were bland and unoriginal. Revelations starts off fairly strong with the opening title-track and "One and the Same" which both feature some good rock-funk riffs from Tom Morello. The first mediocre song arrives by the third track, "Sound of a Gun". Then comes "Until We Fall", one of the mandatory acoustic tracks Audioslave seems to need on each album. It's also a run-of-the-mill song; not bad, but nothing special. "Original Fire", the first single from the album, is one of the better songs from the album. Then the low point of the album with uninspired garbage like "Broken City", "Somedays", and "Jewel of the Summertime". There are a couple other average songs before the album closes with a couple other fairly strong tracks like "Wide Awake" and "Moth". Morello once again displays why he's probably the best guitarist in the last twenty years, fusing his funk and Led Zeppelin-rock inspirations into some great riffs. Chris Cornell's lyrics are above average in some places and downright awful in others. I'd say that Revelations is a half step above Out of Exile, but it's still disappointing that the band seems stuck in a vein of mediocrity and unable to replicate the quality of Audioslave.