Drift is a four piece progressive rock band based in Northern New York (USA). The main member is Jack Blair who plays keyboards, guitars and lead vocals. He also wrote 5 of the 6 tracks. So let me give you an impression of the six songs on Driftsongs, their first CD. La Vaca Baila is an instrumental and good starter to the album, with mainly synths and heavy guitars. It lies somewhere between Porcupine Tree and Pink Floyd. Ned Untrumpted is a very modern progressive rock track. It has a lot of tempo changes and gave a good example of the talents of the other members of the band: Steve Gio on bass guitar, Evan Jacobson on drums and finally Dave Scags on electric and 12 string guitars. The sound and lyrics are a little bit dark, depressive and in the vein of new wave bands like The Sound and The Cure. Faker is very progressive music: flavoured with punk, pop and hard rock, well played, but not my personal favourite, too many repetitions and not enough variety both musically and lyrically. At the end it is a chaotic track, not my cup of tea. The Audition Room starts with a very impressive intro with soundscapes of guitar and synths. Sadly the whiney vocals spoil the atmosphere a little bit. Luckily the guitars save the song. After 5 minutes the whole pace is changed into a happy organ melody with fast drumming and some nice melodic guitar solos towards the end. A little bit in the vein of Dutch band Focus. Some heavy guitar licks (My Sharona !!) introduces Overlook. The poppy rhythm with simple vocals gave me memories of some eighties band like the earlier mentioned The Knack and The Cars. Ending with a desperate singing Jack with panting and hunting guitars. More optimistic is the acoustic beginning of A Goodbye Greeting. Bright and cheerful vocals, but pitiful: and too many repetitions in 5 minutes. Some good musical ideas but overall not much progressive rock and less entertaining than I would like. ** Cor Smeets (edited by Melody Oakley) Where to buy? |
