Frequency Drift just released their new album "Letters To Maro" this past Friday (April 13th) and to celebrate we asked Irini Alexia to tell us about the single "Electricity". Here is the story:
What gives Japanese horror culture the edge over classic Western ghost stories? Is there an innate human longing to be allowed to be irrational? What if you're not alone when you think you are? These are some of the questions our latest single "Electricity" plays upon.
When I joined Frequency Drift as their singer and lyricist in 2017, most of the music on our new album Letters To Marohad already been written. What was still missing were the lyrics - the stories that lay encrypted in the songs. I could not have wished for a more exciting artistic playground: prizing out the meaning trapped in each piece is like a treasure hunt, and the feeling when a story finally breathes free and oscillates through the air as words is exhilarating.
As stories go, Letters To Maro has a couple of recurring themes that blend together differently in each song. "The whole album is inspired by Japanese horror culture, magic realism, urban insanity and the loneliness that comes with 21st century living", explained Andreas and Nerissa, Frequency Drift's musical masterminds. "Go run with those themes!" And run I did - mainly to the library, where I plunged head-on into Haruki Murakami's weird and yet strangely relatable worlds of Norwegian Wood, After Darkand 1Q84. I also soaked up everything I could about what makes Japanese horror stories so much more spine-tingling and blood-chilling than its Western counterparts.
This is what I found: while in Europe and North America ghosts are usually confined to creaky old mansions, medieval graveyards and deep, dark forests (from which today's frightened traveller may easily escape into the clinical comforts of civilization), Japanese ghosts often seem to exist on the substrate of water or electricity - things that flow. With both of these elements running abundantly through modern cities, delivered straight into our homes via pipes and cables, no place is safe. And that way, instead of detaching us from our silly fears of haunted spirits, technical progress just opens new doors for our age-old paranoia to creep back in - from video tapes (remember Ringu?) to smart phones to the internet of things, once you let your imagination run wild, the potential for horror and mischief is as endless as the world wide web.
This is exactly what "Electricity" is about: are you absolutely sure there is nothing surreal going on in your disillusioned, calculable world? I remember driving home from band practice in the evening twilight, listening to the instrumentals of the song. The album version begins with a rousing, pulsating electric vibe, and just as I was listening to that, a row of giant overhead transmission lines glided into view. That's when I knew the story that begged to be told. It's a story about "what-ifs", about allowing your mental images to take you into that irrational space that may well be daft and absurd - and yet has always had a place somewhere deep inside the human psyche.
And let's be honest: it doesn't even have to be the thought of something otherworldly keeping you company through your electronic devices if you want to give yourself the heebie jeebies...
Hearing is believing. Now that you know the story behind the song, listen for yourself and learn more about the album right here!
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