It’s been four years since Eisley last released a full-length due to label setbacks. The Valley, the band’s next release, will be on a new label and will mark a fresh start for the band, but don’t expect the songs on the record to skip over their past.
 
The studio version of “Smarter” features added lyrics and better parts than first heard when the band played the song live nearly two years ago, and the additions are certainly welcome. Some of these newer pieces can easily be attributed to the end of Sherri DuPree and Chad Gilbert’s marriage.
 
Starting off under Stacy DuPree’s slow but effective piano part, Sherri takes the vocals on her most personal song yet. The form certainly fits the content as grungy guitar parts pick up as soon as DuPree sings, “If I sound angry” to push the song into its next phase. The guitar never leaves and truly rounds out the song to help make “Smarter” one of the band’s edgier songs in their long discography.
 
Setting the music aside, the lyrics are what make the track as good as it is, and fans can only hope the rest of The Valley will be as personal. Between a verse with the lyrics “And I apologize for not telling you that my halo was cut from paper // Sliced from the fibers that made up all the parts that we were together” and a bridge with DuPree angrily spitting out, “You are the narcissist // You’re everything you saw in me,” the track is easily one of the band’s best.
 
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