Well, wadd'ya know. After one promising album, Breaking Benjamin tighten up and refine their sound for a superb second album, and befriend Smashing Pumpkin Billy Corgan. Although "Saturate" had the occasional lighter musical touch, "We Are Not Alone" find the BB's really getting into the dynamics of recording. Even the rocking first single "So Cold" shows that they have figured out how to use the studio as an instrument. It still rips like a locomotive, but has a solid sense of texture. So does "Breakdown," which rocks hard but also includes a seriously catchy chorus.

Most indicative of this band's growth are "Forget It" and "Rain." Two of the songs co-written by Corgan, they are the ballads that find lead singer Benjamin Burnley jettisoning his nu-metal growl and actually singing. (They're also 10 times better than anything on Corgan's over-hyped Zwan project.) It makes for a grandiose touch to "Rain" and makes "Forget It" sound like a hit single. It also helps guitar hero in the making Aaron Fink show off his range on both the electric to acoustic leads. Breaking Benjamin beat the sophomore jinx here, and remain a band to watch.

It was a few weeks after I bought this CD that I realized it was not the original version of the album. Unlike, say, Eminem, Breaking Benjamin has put effort into making the edited version of "We Are Not Alone" sound every bit as good as the explisite version, if not better. Highly recommended! This has some awesome songs. The first song, So Cold, has been tearing up the radio recently, u've probably heard it. It has some powerful riffs, but it isn't the best song on the disc. From Simple Design to Forget It, the album gets steadily softer, shifting into a more ballad-esque style. The tone of the record really transforms at the other huge highlight, Breakdown, which is, if not heavy metal, then at least hard rock. Away and Believe follow similar patterns. The closer, Rain, is my least favorite song, but it's still worthwhile. I suggest buying the entire album (and for goodness' sakes, the clean version), but ill rate the individual tracks below if u want to download them from iTunes etcetera:

-So Cold (10/10)
-Simple Design (9/10)
-Follow (8/10)
-Firefly (6/10)
-Break My Fall (10/10)
-Forget It (8/10)
-Sooner or Later (8/10)
-Breakdown (10/10)
-Away (10/10)
-Believe (10/10)
-Rain (7/10)

If u like this CD u will probably also like Breaking Benjamin's EP release "So Cold", which has live versions of So Cold (on acoustic), Away, and Believe, as well as a song from Halo 2 called Blow Me Away. And as a bonus, they threw in a song called Ladybug.

This CD is somewhat different than most rock, but its still very good. So Cold is what first drew me to this CD, and then i got hooked on other songs like Breakdown, Rain, Firefly. I give it 4 stars because it is very good - but i have still heard some better rock CD's than this

This has to be the coolest Cd I own, all the songs on here are excellently written and performed.If I could give it a higher rating I would. The better known songs on here are So Cold and Sooner or Later. Although their probably more popular the other songs are insanely awesome.

This is another one of those CD's that you happen to buy that has probably two decent songs on it and the rest is just not worht the effort. Is anyone is the music industry paying attention? This is why people only want to buy single songs now, because of records like this. These guys sound like Staind when they get in the "I am so serious and damaged that I have to write a song about it" frame of mind.