It took a long time for the Belgian songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Kurt Vereecke to come up with a third album. The melodic band FROZEN RAIN formed back in 2008 and caused quite a stir with their debut, which featured luminaries such as Tommy Denander, Steve Newman and Daniel Flores. The follow-up (“Ahead Of Time” 2012) was similarly successful despite a change of vocalist (Carsten Lizard Schultz replaced Johan Waem). In the following years, things were rather quiet around Vereecke. Now he is trying again with a slightly different team: Lars Edvall (alias ‘Beatlife’) is taking over the mic, Jens Ambrosch is new as guitarist, brother Hans Vereecke and Jurgen Vitrier are back. The interesting guest list includes Roy Nichol from Canadian rock legends APRIL WINE and Roger Ljunggren (T’BELL, PAL, NIVA, OXYGENE).
The musical direction has changed little: AOR/melodic rock in the typical 80s and West Coast style with lots of melody and harmony, catchy choruses, catchy hooks, carried by powerful vocals and concise keyboard and guitar backing.In a word, timelessly beautiful music.The songs are mostly in the genre-typical mid-tempo range, with a half-ballad and a cheesy-sweet ballad (“More Than A Friend”) rounding off the positive overall picture. Comparisons can be drawn with many bands from the (Scandinavian) melodic guard: BAD HABIT, WORK OF ART, AGE OF REFLECTION, CARE OF NIGHT, ALYSON AVENUE, PRIDE OF LION…, so I can definitely recommend “One Mile From Heartsville” to all melodic fans.
