As Switchfoot releases its 12th studio album, interrobang (the first since 2019’s Native Tongue) fans of the San Diego band will be stoked to hear the group’s continued love for its signature rock sounds.

The quintet employs a range of pop, alternative and gospel influences to its sound, rounding and smoothing out its guitar-heavy music that often features raw vocals by frontman Jon Foreman. Despite the similarity to the rest of the discography, Switchfoot sprinkles in lyrics that indicated even Foreman and company couldn’t escape the political polarization, contention and drama of the last year.

The album opens with “beloved,” a song about looking for light and truth. It’s tinged with messages of Christianity—it’s how Switchfoot got its start, after all—a lyrical trope that continues throughout the album. “If only I could open my eyes, would the truth be what would set me free,” Foreman asks. When he reads his news feed, he still doesn’t find the truth he’s seeking, he sings. Despite the nods to the state of the world, there’s nothing overly opinionated or explicit here.

Switchfoot has long rejected being labeled as “Christian rock,” going the young U2 route and instead sprinkling faith into the music to make it less overt. The group distanced itself from Christian publications and festivals in the early aughts in order to cement a more universal fan base, but ultimately won a Grammy for Best Rock Gospel Album for 2009’s Hello Hurricane. It continues to balance these influences well, so if you aren’t Christian yourself, the lyrics can easily be supplemented with new meanings.

On the third track, “fluorescent,” Foreman sings about being a moth outside a window, beating his wings against the front porch light. It’s a call to a woman he’s dreaming of and his wings can’t sustain him too much longer. “How long, my fluorescent favorite?/ How long ’til you run out of light?/ A year, a month, a day, a night,” he sings, conjuring imagery of the short yet profound beauty of the winged insect’s life.

On “if i were you” the political climate and increasing polarization of the last year seeps through and is paired with guitars and drumming to keep the pace. The song takes jabs at different aspects of American life in the last year, ultimately highlighting the unwinnable battle between our country’s strict two-party political system. Switchfoot concludes we’ve sewn so much animosity that even switching places wouldn’t do much. “Yeah, but what if me and you/ Were in each other’s shoes/ Could we break through/ To somewhere different, somewhere new?/ ‘Cuz if you’re stuck with me, I guess I’m stuck with you/ Could we rise above the scars we put each other through,” Foreman sings during the bridge.

On “the bones of us,” Foreman drops a poetic, heavyweight lyric in the opening lines that will stick with you for the rest of the project. “I met the bones of us/ In our old backyard/ And I dug them up with nothing but an old guitar,” he sings. The ballad is much quieter than the rest of the album with a mix of piano and cymbal percussion before guitars enter and the drumming becomes ever so slightly more prominent. Biblical imagery makes an appearance here once again as several voices sing, “Our heart’s like a flood, that washes us new/ I’m fighting for us, but most of all for you.”

The mid-tempo pace continues on “i need you (to be wrong),” the lead single. On the track that had been in the works for years, the questioning lyrics ponder who you can really trust. Despite blaming the partner in the relationship through the chorus, during the final moments a new conclusion is reached: “All along, we both were wrong/ I need you.”

Interrobang concludes with “electricity,” a song that begins with a loud guitar and moves into an easier, more straightforward beat for the first verse and chorus. One of the album’s strongest tracks, it continues to build into anthemic territory full of electricity before subsiding back down. In fact, it’s not too dissimilar to the band itself—grinding out straight-up rock songs since the late ’90s.

If you’re a Switchfoot fan, listen and you’ll find more of that energy and style, likely catching a wave similar to the one the group has been riding.

Follow Domenic Strazzabosco at Twitter.com/domenicstrazz and Instagram.com/domenicstrazz.