LA Music Review | Art, stories and advice
Hopeful and uplifting!
Hi The Power of X, welcome to LA Music Review! Tell us a little bit about you and your music.
I’m Froilan Villegas, the band’s vocalist and guitarist. Our band was initially named Forty-Five on Thirty-Three in the mid-70s during high school. With Ferdie Villeza (bass and vocals), Jerome Bustamante (guitars, vocals and various instruments), Alex Castillo (drums), and Lito Ortega (keyboards), we formed the band. We do renditions of America, Eagles, CSN&Y, and other bands in the 70s. We also created original songs in the same genre.
After our high school graduation, our group disbanded due to residence issues as we live several kilometers apart, and rehearsing became a big challenge for us.
In 2004, we finally met, with the help of social media. We then reformed the group with the name The Power of X where we now write original Christian music. However, Lito Ortega cannot fully commit to the group due to some personal issues and became the band’s session musician whenever he was available for recording.
In June 2021, Ferdie left his bass guitar duties to focus more on being a full-time pastor but helped as the band’s PR and sound engineer. Richie Ridulme is now the band’s bass guitarist.
The mission of our band is to spread God’s message of faith, hope, love, and salvation, not only through our music but through our charitable works also. We can simply be called, “Musicians on a Mission.”
Start streaming “In Your Embrace” here:
Congrats on the release! What was your inspiration when you were writing this project?
Released on March 31, 2023. A good friend Maria Patrica Sanchez wrote this song. She composed three songs in one night. She reached out to me and gave me two of her compositions. Since I seldom collaborate in songwriting, I thought this would be a good opportunity to put music in her lyrics. After about a month, I presented her with a song demo, and she was very happy with it.
What is your vision for this song?
I see this as something that can be sung in Christian group gatherings or assemblies specially in congregational worship. Because the song talks about hope, that whatever challenges we are facing, there will always be peace, love, comfort and joy in God’s embrace.
What is your favorite part of this body of work?
The bridge is my favorite part because it tells us that what matters most is to have God in our hearts.
Anything else we should know about? Future releases?
We have another song scheduled for release in June this year. I wrote the lyrics and music of this song but we’ll be collaborating with another artist to sing with me in this project. We have also another song scheduled for release in September.
