Dear Chris Walla,

As a longtime Death Cab for Cutie fan, I was pretty excited to hear about your solo album. By “longtime fan,” I mean longtime fan. We’re talking around the time that We Have the Facts and We’re Voting Yes was released. I own as many Death Cab for Cutie covers, B-Sides and Rarities and what-have-yous as I have been able to get my hands on. I even own recordings of Pinwheel, Ben Gibbard’s band from his pre-All-Time Quarterback days and tons of demos of yours that you were releasing through your site before anyone even knew you had a solo album.

You’ve always been considered the other boy genius of the band, the guy who never gets as much public cred as he deserves, and for good reason, really. You’ve been the music geek’s favorite, a reserved nice guy who took care of the technical stuff. Not that your bandmate Mr. Gibbard isn’t a reserved nice guy, but, well, you know. You’ve worked on and played on some great albums, and I know some people who’ve recorded with you. I’ve even talked to you — briefly. It seems no one in this world has an unkind thing to say about you.

Well, Chris, that’s what makes this so hard to write. You see, I really, really, really want to like Field Manuala lot, I do. But so far, it’s not exactly grabbing me. It’s not that it’s a bad album, it’s definitely not. It’s just that… (more…)