Dead Letter - Provenience

Dead Letter

Provenience
self-released; 2020

3.7 out of 5

By Matt Jensen

Dead Letter is a solo project by Sean de Leon who is located in Ventura County, California. He recently released Provenience which is a ten-song album. Similar to countless other musicians, once quarantine hit he took the time to get creative. 

His music is a mix of alternative, power pop, hard rock and more. Suffice it to say there are a number of sub genres under the umbrella of rock he dabbles with. This was a fairly pop oriented album in that it contains a lot of catchy, infectious melodies and tons of hooks. The music felt more ’90s oriented. In fact some of the songs had an ’80s tinge to me in a Joe Satriani type of way.

The album begins with “Mind On Fire” which is a solid introduction to his sound. It starts off with a slow hum and quickly ramps up to the sound of a full rocking band. The song sounds great and polished. There is some great guitar work which reminded me of The Edge from U2.

The album really starts to roll out consistently good songs from there. “Vice” is one of the songs that had more of an ’80s vibe to me. It felt like it could be a montage in a movie. The power pop infused “Untrue Believer” and “Eyes Wide Shut” are single worthy songs while “Joy” reminded me of one of my favorite groups — Fountains of Wayne.

He continues to hit it out of the park with “Restless Heart” which sounded a little more contemporary in some ways. “Bad Intentions,” “Iconoclast” and “Halcyon” are also quite catchy. Last but not least is “Revenant” which opens like a huge sounding ’80s arena rock song.

​This was a really consistent album in terms of quality of style. I was also thinking the mood at least was pretty uplifting and fun which I actually wasn’t expecting given that it was written under quarantine. Recommended.

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