A note to record executives - please stop attempting to define your band’s sound by spouting a continual stream of bands as a means of comparison. Just because your PR material is rife with the names of various seminal acts in indie rock circles doesn’t mean that your band will ever be able to live up to the hype you’re hoping to create around them. By attempting to hitch your band’s wagon onto the talent and notoriety of those more recognizable bands, you’re really hampering who the band is and where they can go. Let the band cultivate their own sound and let the fans decide what other bands compare to your band. Neither of those tasks should ever be yours.
Because this is where Sesso.Vita, the new album from The Valley Arena, fails: it sounds nothing like the other bands whose names are dropped in the press release. Marketed as a “string of stories set in a desperate, hyper-sexual, re-imagination of their [the band’s] hometown,” Sesso.Vita (Italian for “Sex/Life”) comes across as an average, chugging collection of songs about the trials and tribulations of an angst-ridden bed-hopper in Long Beach, CA. While the album is filled with solid drumming, thick bass lines, and ringing guitars, something always seems missing in the equation. There are times when the aggression and passion are present and warranted, but more often than not, it sounds like the band is pressing too hard to live up to the sonic forebears listed by the record label’s PR people. And that’s the biggest tragedy here - the band never quite meets the expectations set before them.
-- Adam P. Newton
