Test Spin: Vaux

Does the world really need another band like this? So diluted, they are such an n-th generation knock-off of every other “rock” band out there, that I can hardly even identify who it is they’re ripping off. As it is, they come across like a somewhat screamier incarnation of the current garage rock trend, at times aping the Strokes, in other places going rough and loud like the Hives, yelling over it all with zero subtlety. I feel like I’m wasting my time even reviewing this: every note is so spot-on predictable that I practically guessed what the rest of the album would sound like within the first second of the record.

To complete their mainstream ambitions, they even manage to slow things down a bit on the middle of the album for the ludicrously out-of-place electronic-textured “Four Cornered Lives,” which aims for Radiohead but comes out with Muse. These sub-At the Drive-In rejects will forever be aping their favorite bands in a lame attempt to match their commercial success, and I’ll be the first to spitefully wish failure upon them for the forty minutes I wasted listening to this uninspired mess. Skip it, and get some rock with real balls instead.

Archived article by Ed Howard