Hard Side: Viv - Flawed

by Gary Schwind
Rocknworld, October 27th, 2004

Hard Side: Viv - Flawed
By Gary Schwind


I didn’t really know what to expect from Flawed. Sometimes it’s good to approach an album not knowing what you should expect because there are a lot of opportunities for pleasant surprises.

Viv delivers pleasant surprises in spades. Their sound definitely has a southern rock feel. Let me stop you immediately if your mind drifted to Lynyrd Skynyrd when I mentioned southern rock. No, the sound Viv produces is more similar to Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers (“Flawed”) or Document-era REM (“Bob Dylan Said”). But Viv also has a lot of indie sound in their new music. They are kind of a roots-indie hybrid.

One thing that really impressed me on this disc was Viv’s layers of sound that all meld together nicely. No one member of this band overpowers the others but you can hear each member clearly on every song. Viv also toys with some sort of experimental sound at the beginning of “Bob Dylan Said” and some psychedelia on “Green,” which is the one song on the disc that didn’t really work for me.

Flawed is a solid album showing an array of influences. Perhaps the best thing I can say about Viv is that they seem to be the sort of band you’d see every week if they had a regular gig in your town. I could certainly listen to Viv regularly without getting tired of their music.

http://www.rocknworld.com/features/2004/viv.shtml