In this unfortunate time of boy and girl bands, it is likely that many have started to lose the musical faith. It seems rare today, when a band has soul and depth and even more interesting, when they appreciate making music with their own instruments. There is hope yet.

In its freshman effort, local band borndigital has given real music back to the people. “Texas” is a collection of relaxed melodies and emotional songwriting that provides for a thought-provoking, soul moving experience.

The self-proclaimed pop rock band was formed in 1997 by lead vocalist Omar Alvi and former guitarist Andrew Lehman. Neither member had intentions of forming a group.

“We just started messing around, wrote a couple of songs and decided to start a band. While Andrew was at school in Virginia, we wrote songs and mailed tapes to each other,” Alvi said.

Lehman returned to Columbus and borndigital was formed. However, not long after its conception Lehman left the group. Guitarist Jeff Tayama was brought on board, as well as drummer Andy Kuhar and bassist Steve Squires. Within months, despite its rocky beginnings, borndigital’s solid sound began to evolve.

The band landed a series of gigs in venues around Columbus, and in July 2001 they released Texas to the public. The band sold a significant amount of its music at a release party held at Oldfield’s on 2590 N. North High St. The success of the album was a pleasant surprise.

“The release party went really well and we sold about 200 CDs. We were having a lot of fun writing songs, our sound was continuously evolving and we decided to make the commitment to giving it a shot,” Alvi said.

Texas is a collection of five introspective tracks that deal with love and life. Alvi penned most of the lyrics and looked to the other band members to work in the details of the music. The sound is subtle and creates a well-balanced partnership with the vocals.

“Blue is the Colour” is the first track of the album and is a great introduction to the band’s rhythmic and instrumental talents. It reveals the underlying influences of borndigital’s “English” sound, which comes from the members’ shared love of U2 and other influential artists of Great Britain.

” ‘Blue is the Colour’ is rhythm. It’s a good pop song but not your basic pop song. It has a big sound and big feeling,” Squires said.

“Paris is Breathing” is the most complete and polished track on the album. It’s well written and emotional and showcases Alvi’s strong vocal talent. It is reminiscent of an old Radiohead tune with its constantly changing melodies and depth. “Paris” is the kind of the song that makes you close your eyes when you hear it and the kind of song that separates the mediocre from the real thing.

Additionally, the three other tracks on the album fall somewhere between “Blue” and “Paris” illustrating the band’s versatility. Overall, “Texas” is a powerful and passionate glimpse of an up-and-coming band and it undoubtedly puts borndigital on the map for bigger things to come.

The band has many long-term goals and is working on setting up performances in cities beyond Columbus. They have been featured on CD101 on more than one occasion and are hoping to continuously be added to college radio station play lists.

“We’re not angry, obnoxious or pissed off at the world. It’s rock and roll. It’s really good music and it’s very appealing music. We don’t want to play ourselves to death in Columbus and to prevent that, we need to get out of town more often,” Kuhar said.

The band hopes to be back in the studio within the next few months to start recording some newer material they feel better represents their current sound and the direction they are going.

“The music is not so acoustically driven anymore. The music is evolving a little bit and there are new dynamics to it. The new stuff is a lot different then how “Texas” comes off. It has a lot more power to it but still has really good songwriting,” Kuhar said.

The bottom line is those who are aching for reality in a time of pop music chaos have found their remedy. Borndigital is not to be missed.

Borndigital plays tonight at Capital University and will be back on campus the weekend of Dec. 14. Friday night they will rock the house at Ruby Tuesday and Saturday they will play Oldfield’s.