PERSONAL EFFECTS - PART ONE

FREQUENCY DRIFT's debut album is inspired by movies like 'Blade Runner', 'Lost' and 'Ghost in the Shell' telling the story about River and Romance, two girls living in 2046 where conditions have developed from bad to worse. They are struggling against an imaginary association named 'Diomedeidae' and the song titles are containing time stamps from a one night period giving the time scale for the first part of the story. Lyrics are in English and the band didn't include them into the booklet deliberately to enforce a special concentration on the visual component. They worked together with a graphic designer for that and the CD booklet is full of black-and-white pictures representing a dark atmospheric mood depending on the story. The band members are restraining themselves - no band photo is given and nothing more is to experience about them which provides a mysterious attitude a little bit.

Relying on Katja Hübner's impressive voice (sometimes near to MAGENTA's Christina by the way) the nine songs with a total length of more than 60 minutes are turned out dreamy melancholic in the whole - cinematic as the band undertakes. The instrumental parts are blending some tricky effects with symphonic and heavier rocking elements pushed by a varied keyboard/guitar work and a solid rhythm section. It's more rare that the band is rocking the boat but guitar player Sebastian Koch has enough chances to show his solo talents whereby he sometimes gets near to a significant Gilmour style.

Some interesting samples and synth effects are integrated which confirms the term 'cinematic'. The second song Ghost Memory for example is underlaid with an alienated futuristic choir piece which gives the song a special seductive charme - excellent idea with a distinctive design. Fall is dominated by a memorable refrain and Romance convinces as an eclectic art rock highlight - an example of innovative songwriting. The title track Personal Effects is a nice piano solo excursion taken over by the comparatively heavy Anger initiated by a forceful drum intro.

FREQUENCY DRIFT has worked out a quite unique profile with this debut which is expandable anyhow - comparable with bands like Sylvan, Poor Genetic Material and Magenta for a clue in a wider sense. And the appendix 'part one' implies: a follower is already announced - hopefully provided with a more optimistic story - 3.5 stars really ...

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