Guitarist Nick Piscitello describes his band simply: “We’re just a rock band…We just have fun; I don’t really think of us as anything more important than the next guy. I just think that we’re four friends that get out there and have fun every night that we play.” He makes it clear that he and his Spark Of Life bandmates – vocalist Steve Jennings, bassist Josh Williams, and drummer (and brother) Anthony Piscitello – are “pretty regular guys…None of us really look rock ‘n’ roll,” adding self-deprecatingly, “None of us really look anything. We’re just four dudes who play music.” Oh, but they’re anything but ordinary. Formed in 1999 in Southern California, Spark Of Life is REAL. There’s no facades here, just an extreme passion for creating music and a genuine, almost tangible, sense of camaraderie. It’s evident when Nick describes the best part of their live show, which “would definitely be what you see on-stage: the energy of the friendship that goes on and how there’s this strong connection that when we’re on-stage, we’re not playing so much for everyone else, but we’re playing for each other…The unit that we have on-stage is pretty unbreakable, and I think that when you see a Spark Of Life show, you can feel that there is true friendship and enjoyment and also at the same time, excitement,” and in the fact that he can’t imagine playing with any other group of musicians: “At this point, if somebody in Spark Of Life said, ‘I’m done,’ we wouldn’t play as Spark Of Life anymore. If Josh quit, then we wouldn’t go out and search for another bass player. If Steve quit, we wouldn’t get another singer,” and so on. On the same note, this sense of purpose is evident in the title of their debut full-length on Lorelei, 'Promises Made. Promises Kept.' As Nick explains, it holds deep meaning to the band. Originally intending to just release it as a self-titled album, the four men decided to go for a more significant moniker. Basically, Nick says that as a band, “we made a promise to ourselves that we would stick with it and sort of reinvent our sound and ourselves.” Continuing on the same “promise” theme, he says that when Lorelei signed them, it reinforced this feeling: “It was sort of like a promise made and a promise kept to ourselves.” And what this group of inventive individuals set out to do on their debut was to “not hold anything back…We didn’t limit ourselves going, ‘Ok, we’re just gonna be a hardcore band, we’re just gonna be a post-hardcore band, we’re just gonna be whatever.’ You know, we just sort of went into the writing process as we’re gonna play what we’re feeling at this moment.” And this attitude towards writing and recording comes through on 'Promises.' Not easily pigeonholed in just one genre, SoL jump from hardcore, as on the brutal opener “From Ash Rises Hope”, the intriguing “Intellectual Bankruptcy”, and “Counting Seconds”, which also features more melodic parts as well, to less abrasive fare – note, I won’t call it “pop” per se, for these guys never lose their hard edge – during their catchiest numbers like “Hooks Every Foot” and “Welcome Home Relax and Slow Down”, the latter of which, showcases a pop-punk feel. Yet, despite the apparent differences found throughout the record, the music remains cohesive and consistent. And this very aspect is what Nick believes to be SoL’s greatest strength: this ability to mix many different elements gives the band it’s own style and sets them apart from many other bands who stick to one clear-cut, by-the-books sound. They don’t seem to go by any one formula, such as loud-soft-loud or adding screams in a certain part because they SHOULD be there. Rather, the contrasting elements within each song seem to just flow naturally, in an easy, unforced manner. Lyrically, I found the record to be mostly positive. Nick agrees, noting that Steve writes all the lyrics and that he “tries to encompass what we as a band are feeling at certain times and have gone through.” He says that many of the songs deal with subject matter that many people can relate to and have experienced, whether it be “some time in their life where they’re struggling with some bull-crap time they had in high school or dealing with a relationship break-up and moving on and just sticking to your guns – sort of what the album title is, you know, 'Promises Made. Promises Kept.' – sort of like to yourself.” The majority of the songs, he continues, touch upon the theme “that there’s a lot of bad crap that goes on, but there’s always hope for something better at the end of the tunnel,” quickly adding, “Or you know, tomorrow.” But why are the lyrics indecipherable in the sleeve? Well, it’s not that the band doesn’t want the listener to understand the lyrics, that’s for sure. His explanation is rather sly and makes much sense: “The lyrics are on our website (www.sparkoflifemusic.com), and so I was just thinking, ‘Oh, people will go to our website, let’s have them there.’” However, his shrewd ploy to increase the traffic to the site is only part of the reason. “I wanted the design of the CD to turn out sort of how the music is – how there’s a lot of rhythm and a lot of chaos going on in certain parts, but you can pull out key things that really speak to you. And so if you’re really looking at the back, you can read some of the lyrics but not all of it. You can sort of make it out, but at the same time, I just really wanted people to listen to the CD.” We both managed to agree on what track was most energetic: “For What Used to Be”. Hands down. This song, as Nick discloses, “Was the [most fun] to record. We’ve been playing it so long and it’s sort of like our anthem to ourselves…so we really had a lot of fun with that in the studio.” It was one of the last songs they recorded and they decided they’d “not hold anything back.” What stands out and adds to the anthemic quality are the gang vocals towards the end that passionately chant the song’s title. Overall, it’s just a great offering. But recording this one track wasn’t the only thing fun about the band’s time in the studio. The guys were lucky enough to work with Russ Rankin, legendary Good Riddance frontman and Lorelei co-owner, who despite his “business-like” demeanor, still contributed to the fun. However, Russ wasn’t about to let SoL blow their chance at creating an important, impressive album by having too much of a good time. “He really brought a serious aspect to the band and to what we were doing in the studio,” Nick relates. Still, even though they had an extremely positive experience in the studio, Nick says SoL’s true passion is being on-stage. “The recording process is really fun ‘cause you can sort of let your hair down and try other things, but at the same time, playing live is really where what we do best comes out…We’ll add little things playing live and we’ll have that energy and that spark.” He goes on to say that this feeling “just carries on. Once we’re done, we just wanna go out and play another show, so we try to play shows as much as possible and make them the best time of our life. And 2004 will see SoL touring, touring, touring, if things go the band’s way. For the New Year, Nick declares that they are planning on playing “as many shows as we can. We just wanna go out there and play.” He says this past summer was a bit difficult due to circumstances he didn’t elaborate on, but that they definitely want to “be gone this summer and get picked up on a good tour and come back and get picked up on another good tour.” They haven’t made the trek out to the East Coast yet, but prospects for a full U.S. tour are looking good. This summer, Nick and the gang are thinking about playing a slew of West Coast dates and then mid-summer, heading out on a coast-to-coast tour. Anyone who lives in a city where SoL are playing should certainly make it out to one of their shows for a night of fun, intense energy, and just some good hard-hitting tunes.