Mercury Rev
All Is Dream

Distributed by
V2

Year: 2001

Rating: 10/10

Cat. No: WR 1017521

Whilst Mercury Rev have been treading their own singular and idiosyncratic path since the late 80's, it took 1998's Deserter's Songs to bring them to the attention of a wider public.

Since the release of that album, Mercury Rev have been hailed as pioneers of nu-psychedelia with bands such as Flaming Lips, Grandaddy and the Elephant 6 collective following in their wake.

So, All Is Dream, the band's fifth album, has a lot to live up to. And boy, does it succeed. If the previous LP sounded like a warped compendium of late 20th Century Americana, turning outwards for its inspiration, this new one faces inwards, on a journey to the centre of the unconscious mind where, indeed, all is dream.

There is a feeling of otherworldliness that runs throughout the album which is conveyed so effectively through the almost ghostly vocals of Jonathan Donahue and the haunting string arrangements that are spread across the album providing a sumptuous, if so mewhat unsettling backdrop.

As the album works so well as one piece, it feels almost unfair to pick out individual songs but special mention must be given to Chains, which is like hearing the theme from a 1960's spy movie beamed down from the Planet Neptune. Lincoln's Eyes, also, which reminds me of the music played in the radiator sequence from Eraserhead - hallucinatory and disconcerting.

Praise too, for Spiders and Flies with its mellotron flutes, stark piano lines and achingly wistful vocals and closing track Hercules, quite possibly the best single thing the band have done in its full and rather fantastic career to date.

All in all, an absolute masterpiece of an album which deserves to be heard by all those who still complain that guitar-based music has had its day, that there are no longer any new ideas or novel ways to express them through such a conservative medium.

All Is Dream is a modern classic packed full of astounding sounds and amazing music. And as to the lyrics? Well, if this really is all a dream then someone must have been eating pretty strong cheese before they went to bed!!

Review copyright © Gary Thorogood, 2001.