Free of Freedom by Beyond From Within is an original piece of work. According to correspondence with creator Steve Andrews, his “psychappella” is influenced by 1960s Psych/Pop/Rock. And since I’m a bona fide hippie love child Aquarian, what wouldn’t I love about that?

A lot.

To be honest I went and listened to Andrews' original accompanied version of the song (the video is on YouTube) to get a sense of what this band was all about. I feel like this “a cappella” version is simply the track that producers place on a maxi-single so that DJs can create remixes using the artist’s vocals. It isn’t a true-to-form a cappella arrangement of a song.

Therein lies the major problem with the track; there’s not a lot here. Most of the song is the solo with reverb tacked on for the verses. Andrews has an amicable voice — something that you’d possibly hear on a Haight-Ashbury corner in ’67 — exactly what he’s striving for. It’s airy, though with a very pointed intonation, and he scoops a lot. Unfortunately, he also has problems phonating the "Fr" in the word "Free". It sounds like "Bree" — a major issue when the titular lyrical line in the chorus is "I am free of freedom" and it becomes "I am bree of freedom." 

Andrews does sing harmonic lines during the chorus and the outro that bring some much needed interest to the track. But it is too little, way too late. On the third verse we’re treated with echo arpeggios that create so much dissonance that I lose the unity and “harmony” that he wants to create. And don’t forget that it’s psychedelic — so all of the electronic blips and bleeps are distracting.  

The thing is, I can definitely see where he's going with this, and I’m on board with it. I just need Beyond From Within to get musical assistance and lyrical help (the words are exactly what you would think … read about Beyond From Within on the Web) from people who actually work in the a cappella field to help the vision come to fruition.