With an EP and now two full length albums to their name, Orange Avenue appears to be on their way to becoming a mainstay act in the alternative genre. The band has already had many of their songs featured on prominent television stations including MTV, Fox Sports, and Nickelodeon, and most recently released their newest record, Small Victories, earlier this year. Drummer, Sean Sedita, spent time with Alternative Addiction discussing the new album, the uncertainty surrounding the group’s future plans, and even shared details regarding a car crash that the band was incredibly fortunate to walk away from unscathed.

After building a substantial fanbase in their home state of Florida with their self-titled debut in 2007, Orange Avenue quickly built upon their success by touring as much as possible and then released their EP, Reset, in 2009. As their popularity spread, the band was able to share the stages with established acts such as All American Rejects, We The Kings, Pop Evil, and Egypt Central. And in February of this year, the five-piece released Small Victories with the title serving as a metaphorical nod to the band’s career thus far. Said to be their best work yet, the album includes the single, “As You Fall,” which has quickly been recognized as one of the top songs off the record. “It’s a ballad and it’s one of our favorites. And the thing is we actually weren’t going to put it on the record but then our producer called one night and was yelling because we submitted a whole bunch of new demos and he thought we were crazy for not including the song on the album.  So after that, of course we decided we’d put it on the record.” 

Considering this was Orange Avenue’s third time writing new music for an album, the band had little difficulty finding their niche in the studio for the recording of Small Victories. And as Sedita commented, it was also incredibly helpful for the band to be able to team up again with Peter Thornton, Brooks Paschal, and Jimmy Rowand - all of which whom had a hand in the engineering, producing, and mixing of Reset as well. “As far as the record goes, all of us in the band write and we all give ourselves the freedom to play our instruments and really make the vocals and melodies the way we want.  And then we’re also very open-minded to listening to suggestions. We don’t just sit there and say this has to be one way; we always do what will be best for the song. We were also fortunate enough to hook up with the same people we did our previous EP with…they’re all great guys; our mindsets and our thoughts are all on the same page.  They’re really an extension of the band.  Everything we’re thinking they’re already on it and they seem to be able to make the right suggestions for the things we’re trying to get to.”

While out on the road recently, Orange Avenue and their crew experienced quite a scare on the New Jersey Turnpike. Caused by a blown out tire, the group’s van spun out of control resulting in quite the accident; though the band’s manager and sound engineer were left a bit banged up, thankfully no fatally injuries occurred. But unfortunately for the group, the van and trailer were left damaged beyond repair leaving Orange Avenue now searching for a new set of wheels. “It was on the New Jersey Turnpike. The van and trailer were totaled, our manager had a fractured hand and glass in his elbow so his arm was all swollen, and our sound engineer has a broken finger. I don’t know how, but nothing really happened to any of the band members and luckily enough no one else around us was injured or anything like that. We just had a blowout on the van and spun out of control going over the shoulder.”

As Orange Avenue looks to move forward and expand upon their newfound notoriety, Sedita was open about the fact that the band is currently unsure about what their next move should be. In today’s music industry which is has proven to be quite unpredictable, it can be rather challenging to determine what the best action is for a band to take; and of course, the pressure surrounding the decision making process only increases when a group is still limited by monetary setbacks as is Orange Avenue. “We’ve been talking about a lot of different next steps. We don’t know if the next step is to actually go into the studio to write and record more, or if we should just start touring in promotion of the record…we try to be as savvy as we can be as far as making smart decisions because we are an independent band and we don’t have big bucks behind us.  So everything that we spend and do has to be smart.”

Small Victories is currently available to purchase at the iTunes store for an affordable $5.99. Orange Avenue is also planning to release a music video for “As You Fall” in the near future; the video which Sedita described as “more or less a love story” will be based in a post apocalyptic type war setting and will coincide with the theme and title of the record.