Final Frontier is the side project of Von Groove guitarist Mladen,  and the whole enterprise is built around his song writing partnership with Rob Moratti. Previously to this album the band had released two albums on Z Records, their debut opus entitled The First Wave and then 2002's follow up The Second Wave before moving onto Frontiers for their third release, High Tension Wire. However for Freelight, their fourth album, Final Frontier once again have switched labels and find themselves signed with Escape Music. 

The band's music can be best be described as American AOR with huge Survivor influences as well as artists such as Giant, Amaze Me and John Parr immediately springing to mind. Musically Final Frontier are pretty much spot on and as Mladen seems responsible for most the instrumentation, he deserves a big pat on the back as the tracks sound like a million dollars, despite being slightly derivative of the genre at times. 

But and you all saw this coming from the score at the top of the page, Rob Moratti is the weak link in the chain. He has a vice that sounds like a blend of Jimi Jamsion, Tony Harnell and Tony Mills, all good high pitched singers that I like, but then he sounds like he’s been at the helium and comes across like Pinky and bloody Perky  like - for those of you too young to remember they were the 60/70's pig puppets who had one or two novelty hits. Alternatively it could also be that Moratti sounds like old 45rpm speeded up to 78rpm (Anybody under the age of 30 is now scratching their heads!!). When he refrains from straining for the highest ranges of his voice then, in all honesty, Moratti isn't bad at all. It's just that on the majority of the album he insists on going for those high notes and at times is almost unlistenable. It's a shame really as Final Frontier have a decent set of songs here, it's just the vocals that most people, myself included, will pick up on...

Let us know your views on 'Freelight'

Track List

Freelight
Dynamo
Foolish Pride
Only The Lonely
I Hope You Don't Mind
Someone's Watching You
All The Way
Nothing Is Easy
Lion's Den
The Witches Mask
Half Way Home
Delia

Line Up

Rob Moratti - Vocals
Mladen - Guitar/Bass/Keys
Lawrence Falconer - Guitars,
Kevin Howley - Drums