By JOSEPH VITALE
MANAGING EDITOR

The first and only time I have seen Young the Giant perform was on a disastrously rainy day at the Governors Ball. In the muddy fields of Randall’s Island, standing in the rain, it seemed like the few thousand of us wanted to be anywhere but watching the lead singer, Samheer Gadhia, running about on the wet stage. It was not until they opened with the chord progression of “My Body” that the crowd swelled with energy — but it was the indie rock group’s last song of the set.

On their sophomore release, the 50-minute long Mind Over Matter, the group returns with more poppy synths and equally dissatisfying flavor. Many of the songs fade into anonymity after the first chorus, as they badly lack the personality of alternative rock’s big names. Marked with cringe worthy lyrics (“I missed that train, New York City – it rains!/ Fly to east L.A. in big jet planes/You know you’re on my mind”), the album itself falls flat of conjuring any remotely tangible emotions or sounds; any of their good ideas seem lost in the songwriting process. At the least, the standout tracks (“Crystallized,” “It’s About Time”) show off the group’s ability to write an explosive hook, which carried its last album, but seems, at this point, to be a crutch if anything.

Distorted, simple riffs and uninspired synth leads provide background noise for the struggles depicted in the band’s lyrics. The downfall is that the struggles found on these tracks are all bland, vague and lifeless. By the end, even caring about what happens next is a struggle in itself.