Mercury Rev - All Is Dream

7.5 - USA - 2001

The follow-up to 1998's masterpiece, Deserter's Songs, this record, on the one hand, looks back to Mercury Rev's earlier work. Gone are the layers of woodwinds, organs, and Chamberlin strings, and instead we have the distorted guitars more redolent of Boces or Yerself Is Steam. The warm rustic Americana of its predecessor is peeled away to reveal a darker, less lush sound, one that could almost be described as "gothic psychedelia". For the most part, the songs hold up, even if they don't sound as good as anything from Deserter's Songs. "Tides Of The Moon" is a standout, due in no small part to the bowed saw from "Holes" popping up again. "Nite And Fog" features a bouncy melody and some excellent drumming from Jeff Mercel.Elsewhere, however, "Lincoln's Eyes" is a long tedious wait for an ultimately underwhelming crescendo, and "A Drop In Time" is "Tonite It Shows" if the latter were indeed just a little too precious.

And therein lies the other hand: just as the album hearkens back to the Rev's pre-Deserter's work (which is good), it also grimly anticipates the schlock that would follow (which is bad). Jonathan Donahue's voice gets a little cloying and squeaky in places and the lyrics have shifted from impressionistic abstraction to teenage girl diary confession. While the album, overall, is pretty good, it's soured by the fact that it contains the seeds of the craptacular The Secret Migration. An unfair assessment, perhaps, but there you go. Also, minor production quibble: not unlike Mogwai's Come On Die Young (also produced by the Rev's Dave Fridmann), the drums are rather high in the mix. As Jeff Mercel's drum work is one of the album's best parts, it's not that much of a problem, but the bass (also played by producer Fridmann) suffers from being left in the background, giving the tracks an occasional "empty" feeling. But I digress...