The title of Taking Back Sunday's latest CD — "New Again" — pretty much sums up the feeling within the band as the group tours behind the CD this summer.

With the arrival of new guitarist Matt Fazzi, Taking Back Sunday has found new life, both on a musical and personal level, and the band's excitement is evident in both the songs on "New Again" and the vibe that surrounds the band on and off stage as it begins touring in support of the new CD.

That was the word from bassist Matt Rubano in a recent phone interview, as he looked back at the highs and the lows of life within Taking Back Sunday over the past two years.

The biggest lows came in the latter months of the band's touring in support of its 2006 CD, "Louder Now."

At the time, Taking Back Sunday was on its most high-profile tour, having landed a featured slot on the 2007 Projekt Revolution tour, headlined by Linkin Park and My Chemical Romance.

But as the tour got going, things were coming apart in Taking Back Sunday, at least as far as the group's guitarist Fred Mascherino was concerned. After the tour, Mascherino left the group and to pursue his own project, the Color Fred.

What should have been a highlight in the band's career became anything but that.

"Certainly, toward the end of Projekt Revolution, I remember really not liking how I felt out on stage every night and feeling like my body was glued down to the stage and it was hard for me to get excited," Rubano said. "I never want to feel that way again. That was the worst feeling in the world, to be in this band, to be in this big rock band, go out on stage in front of 10,000 people and kind of just not feel so great about what you're doing."

The band soldiered on throughout Projekt Revolution, and according to Rubano wasn't thrown off track when Mascherino quit.

In early 2003, after the release of its third CD, "Tell All Your Friends," original members John Nolan (guitar/screamed vocals) and Shaun Cooper (bass) abruptly quit the group. Considering that album had sold some 350,000 copies and made Taking Back Sunday a band to watch on the modern rock scene, the departures came at a critical juncture for the group.

But Mascherino and Rubano stepped into those vacancies and the band moved right along. It released the CD "Where You Want To Be" in 2004, and watched it top 500,000 copies sold and earn Taking Back Sunday a major label deal with Warner Bros. Records.

"Louder Now" matched the popularity of the previous album, and solidified Taking Back Sunday's place as one of the better bands in modern rock — at least until Mascherino's departure again provided reason for fans to worry about Taking Back Sunday's future.

As luck would have it, when band members Rubano, Adam Lazzara (vocals), Eddie Reyes (guitar) and Mark O'Connell (drums) reconvened after their break to begin the search for Masherino's replacement, the first musician to audition was Fazzi. The band auditioned some other guitarists because they were already scheduled to do so, but Rubano said it was clear from the first audition that Fazzi was the man for the job.

"Matt's not only a really talented guitar player and also just an able musician, he is a very atypical guitar player," Rubano said. "And when it comes to writing music, he's got like a fearless inventiveness that he really helped spread to the rest of us, such that we erased all the lines that we used to think or subconsciously think we had to work within and started doing anything in the world that we thought sounded good."

While "New Again" retains the crunchy but catchy guitar rock of earlier albums, Rubano said he can hear new facets in the Taking Back Sunday sound all over "New Again," as the band explored odd time signatures, some unorthodox arrangements and three-part vocal harmonies — all elements that hadn't come into play on previous albums.

The same enthusiasm and inventiveness that characterized the writing and recording of "New Again" is now carrying over to the live stage, Rubano said, as Fazzi's playing has freshened up the Taking Back Sunday sound and prompted the band to even approach older material with fresh ears.

(Recorded evidence of the live Taking Back Sunday experience can be heard on a newly released concert CD, "Live From Bamboozle '09," available through iTunes.)

"What matters most about the live sound thing is not only the fact that he (Fazzi) has contributed to all of this new music, but we sort of take a look at the old songs, and we're not rewriting them or reworking them, but we are sort of sharpening them up," Rubano said. "It sort of brings a freshness to even music from the past for us. We have four LPs worth of music to work from when we're making a set list, and it really just makes for the best shows that I think we've ever done."

Taking Back Sunday with All-American Rejects

When: Tuesday, Nov. 10, and Wednesday, Nov. 11, at 7 p.m.

Where: Showcase Live, 23 Patriot Place, Foxborough

Tickets: $35

Info: 888-354-7042 or http://showcaselive.com/