You’re speeding down a long stretch of highway, driving some crossbreed between a DeLorean and whatever the design theme behind Tron (1982) thought a 2030's car was going to look like. Lining the edges of the highway are bright neon-lit markers, but you don’t need them yet to demarcate the dusty, post-apocalyptic desert around you. Far in the distance is the skyline of your metropolitan destination, framed by a refracted sunset in shades of surrealism, every vibrant color of a jelly bean somehow represented. To your left, your incarnated AI companion flashes a bright but vapid smile in the passenger seat, meeting your gaze with eerily perfect poise and timing. They are unaware and probably incapable of processing the imminent upgrade that’s waiting for you at the end of this long road. The soundtrack to your wistful nostalgia, loneliness and the twinges of regret and empathy you’re feeling towards your companion is blasting through the interior of your car: It’s Dreamwake’s latest album, The Lost Years.
Dreamwake very much evoke an 80's retro sci-fi road trip as described above with their style of synth-wave infused modern metal-core. Complemented by sultry saxophone sections and synths ripped straight from the Stranger Things playbook, this Connecticut quartet maintains a heavy and hooky presence throughout twelve tracks. Slick like an oily mullet, and with the same type of questionable, hit-or-miss sex appeal, this stuff definitely isn’t for everyone. Having been introduced to Dreamwake a few years ago, I somewhat begrudgingly fell in love with 2022's Virtual Reality. That album had a fast food-like effect on me, and the more I listened to it the deeper it sank its garish, purple-lacquered talons into my heart and soul. When I spied the promo for The Lost Years through my allegedly ironic pink aviator glasses, I could once again not resist this musical equivalent to whatever ill-advised sweet and savory snack is the current TikTok trend.
On The Lost Years, this flashy four–piece is still peddling a similar blend of greasy guitar-work with a sugary core. They have here and there ramped up the heaviness of their vocals and breakdowns, on tracks like “Dark Eternal”, “White Noise” and “Oasis”, and have managed to delight me with delectably hooky melodies and choruses on nearly every song on offer. There are some very juicy, whammy-wanky solos and riffs sprinkled throughout these tracks and “White Noise”, and some of the more melodic guitar runs on “Afterglow” and “Supernova” have a swancore-like quality that even verges into Fallujah territory on “Oasis”. The sugary, cotton candy qualities of the clean vocals, synths and saxophone slide into the soundscape with a remarkable fluidity, dueling with heavy chugging, busy and very '80s coded drumming, and competent but somewhat unremarkable harsh vocals. Dreamwake’s ability to fuse these styles together shows their competence as songwriters, since to be perfectly candi(e)d I’m still not sure how this album hasn’t ended up a smoldering scrapheap smoking crumpled against a roadside neon sign.
As with every sugar rush, the crash is still somewhat inevitable, and The Lost Days suffers from the over-saturation of its slick soundscape on occasion. The album could definitely do with some more variety in tone and structure, and while most of the riffs are hooky winners, there is some over-reliance on chuggy, downtuned guitar parts here and there. While these contrast nicely with the saccharine melodies, the end result can sound a bit formulaic at times, which isn’t helped by the processed and somewhat sterile production choices. The lyrics are also not particularly inspired, and are a bit awkward here and there, as exemplified by “White Noise”, which fortunately pulls out of its lyrical nosedive by the grace of its excellent melodic hooks. I’m still very impressed by how naturally Dreamwake pull off this chimeric cyborg of a musical style, and—considering how often I’ve revisited Virtual Reality over the past years—I’m confident this album has more staying power than its sugary, retro-futuristic rush might suggest.