HERETICS

As the pounding rhythm of Dream the Electric Sleep's new album 'Heretics' blasts its way into your ear canals, you can tell that you are in for some inspired, incredible music. Dream the Electric Sleep hails from Lexington, KY; not exactly a hot spot of progressive activity. Yet, the band has crafted what will surely be seen as one of the best of 2014, for sure. Aside from having a great name based on Philip Dick's novel, Dream the Electric Sleep has loads of massive sounds to share with us, and they also seem to have a connection with their fans that is pretty rare nowadays.

The band is made up of Matt Page on vocals/keys/guitar, Joey Waters on drums/vocals, Andrew Hibpshman on guitar, and Chris Tackett on bass. The guys display a mix of sounds and influences that are quite eclectic. I once described their music as a mix of indie rock and Anathema's style of climactic melodies with a vocalist that reminds me of Kim Benzie of Dead Letter Circus. I think I'd stand by my description for the most part, but I would also add U2 in there somewhere. With delicate acoustic guitars and roaring electric licks, pounding and well-mixed drums, awesome bass, and ultra-melodic and atmospheric keys; the band has a fresh sound that feels seasoned, mature, and inspired on multiple levels. The first thing that caught me about this album was the style of melody. As I said, they are rather climactic, but the beauty and variety are even more noteworthy. There is something so pure and so emotional and so real about the way this band composes music, and you cannot help but feel they are right there in front of you. The melodies are very distinct for each song, and many of them feel very much like an old favorite for some reason. They are as original as they come, but the melodic style of Dream the Electric Sleep is such that the music just feels right.

'Heretics' is more than music, though. It is a concept album based generally upon the women's suffrage movement, and the torn hearts that its proponents held within themselves. One thing that really impresses me about Dream the Electric Sleep is there clarity of mind. Fans want to know what lyrics mean, plain and simple. The band provides this in their Guide to Heretics, a loose breakdown of the album. As one that appreciates lyrics, this is seriously impressive. The content, then, is rather emotional and moving, and the band certainly wants it that way.

Again and again this album floored me. I didn't really connect on the first listen, but I was really gripped on the second time. 'Heretics' is a fantastic introduction, but it leads into my favorite song on the album, the delicate and pleasant 'Elizabeth'. Matt Page's vocals are truly sublime on this track, and throughout the album, even. Yet, the album never lets up, as it delivers the massively acoustic 'Utopic', the lovely 'To Love is to Leave', and the strangely groovy 'It Must Taste Good' (my second favorite). Excellent songs join each other end to end, and the album pushes on breathlessly. The album finishes with the climactic 'How Long We Wait' and the slightly heavier 'Ashes Fall', both amazing and rather theatrical in some ways. 'Heretics' never lets you go, and this is especially true because of the variety on the album. We get emotionally heavy songs, delicate nostalgic ballads, complex structures, and experimental collaborations. I just love it.

Dream the Electric Sleep's 'Heretics' is a must-hear for 2014. It's that simple. Any serious progressive fan should hear it, but the music is such that anyone could love this album. With overarching melodies, giant displays of finesse, varied compositions, and even occasional chaotic moments; 'Heretics' is truly something distinguished from the pack and exceptionally produced. Get this album, as it's FREE for download on their Bandcamp page. That's right, it's FREE, though you should really give them at least a little for this monster album. Give. Support. Share.

4.5 stars

Absolutely my favorite album that I've heard this year and I can't imagine hearing something come out later this year that will dethrone it. Dream the Electric Sleep is a 3-person band, which is hard to believe after listening to the album due to the immense sound that they produce.

To me, the music sounds completely unique in its style, the drumming is mostly a pulse pounding beat (which as a drummer I haven't heard much like, making it very awkward to play which is proving to be great exercise to improve my drumming), beautiful riffs and INCREDIBLE vocals that are very contagious (I've lost my voice singing along in car rides by myself a number of times)

Be sure to check out A GUIDE TO THE HERETICS, which can be found on the bands website, which explains the concept of the album. The lyrics are beautiful and empowering.

Highlight tracks are Heretics(starts off blistering and ends beautifully), Elizabeth, Fist To Face, Lost Our Faith (so powerful.. those vocals), How Long We Wait (again.. those vocals), and Ashes Fall.. But in all seriousness there is not a single track that is worth skipping.

For me, this is an essential album.

5/5

Oh, how I've missed this.

2013 was hardly a stellar year in my ears. I honestly consider 2013 in music to be one of the biggest statistical anomalies, because given that I heard over 300 albums, there should be a high chance that there would be plenty of classic records. But alas, the only album to gain a high rating from me was The Raven That Refused to Sing (And Other Stories) (8.7), whereas there were eight albums and two EPs from 2012 that gained higher than that merit. As a person who bases everything I do on statistics, and gets very frustrated when they don't fit perfect curves or trajectories, this was truly frustrating indeed. So, I'm glad to announce that not only has the first month of 2014 brought me the best album of the year so far, but it's also the best album of last year as well (if that makes sense (it probably doesn't)).

Dream The Electric Sleep are an American band who have been around since 2010, and this is their second album. I have their first album as well, but I have honestly been too immersed in this to pay attention to much else. Heretics is a long album ' over 70 minutes, and is a concept album regarding something about women and oppression in the early 20th century. For those who are interested in lyrics (not me, honestly, although there are some great bits of sibilance scattered throughout), vocalist Matt Page has done a write-up on the concept here. I was first drawn to this album from here on RYM of all places (not usually my first stop for progressive rock), when I noticed an abnormally high 4.15 rating from 15 users. Even though many users are notable for rating albums too highly, five of the ratings were from my 'trusted' group of users here, people who give high ratings sparingly, so this 4.15 really meant something, especially to my statistically inclined mind. I have been meaning to phase out my constant listening to new music recently (although I'm kinda failing), but there was no way I could skip over this. A quick google later, and I found that this was in fact released on bandcamp's fantastic name-your-price platform, which has heralded some true gems over the years (including four of the ten releases from 2012 that I mentioned).

At the core of its sound, Heretics is hard on the progressive end of the alternative-progressive rock fusion genre that I (and a handful of other people) are calling post-prog. The immediate comparisons to bands like Muse and The Dear Hunter stem from Matt Page's indie and alternative influenced croon, which soars over the atmospheric and epic instrumentation in a variety of ways. On the ballad track 'To Love Is To Leave', the rather beautiful hook line is delivered in a way that definitely calls to mind Children of Nova's Teo, with the indie-style vocals that adorned tracks like 'It's Just A Ride'. Dream The Electric Sleep are in no means an indie band, but like an lot of these post-prog bands, they feel like a band firmly rooted in alternative rock that takes the genre to the extremes with its structuring and instrumentation, hence the progressive rock genre tag.

Imagine if Thirty Seconds to Mars had continued along the progressive stylings that they have hinted at on a couple of records, add in some of Anathema's skill at crescendos and epic builds, and Matthew Bellamy's theatricality and over-the-top vocals, and you might have an idea of what Heretics sounds like. Or, at least, an idea of what a track like 'Elizabeth' sounds like, easily my favourite one on here. Many might take my comparisons to Thirty Seconds To Mars as an insult, but I mean them in the greatest way possible, and to claim that the glorious and intense chorus of 'should you find the sun, will you let us know?' is not reminiscent of some of the melodies atop This Is War is ridiculous. And I honestly believe that this album, in many ways, is the album that I've always wanted Thirty Seconds To Mars or Muse to make, but their mainstream inclinations and the fact that Jared Leto is a superstar in two realms of art (and Matt Bellamy is married to Kate Hudson) have kept them from making it.

But what makes Heretics brilliant, and above a lot of today's straight progressive rock, is the same sort of elements that keep me coming back to the bands I loved when I was younger. Sure, Muse and My Chemical Romance may not have the most interesting or complex arrangements, song structures or instrumentation, but they always had those spinechilling melodies, the ones that are so simple yet so beautiful that you forget everything you've learnt about appreciating odd time signatures and long tracks and just be immersed in the melody. When I hear the chorus of 'Elizabeth', I feel these same feelings. There's something so utterly enthralling about the melody, it's crushing, it's euphoric (as much as I hate that word now), it really transcends music and becomes something beyond that.

But it's not as if Dream The Electric Sleep are just this. The bands I mentioned, especially Thirty Seconds To Mars, rely solely on these devices, on making their music emotional and epic, but Dream The Electric Sleep do actually have complex instrumentals, they do actually have longer tracks, and they are much more than just simple alternative rock. We have five songs here that push past eight minutes, and if you count the double-hit of 'Lost Our Faith' and 'How Long We Wait' as one entity (the seamless transition does suggest that), then it has a 12-minute run time. But instead of taking the prog clich' of filling the record with meaningless solos and instrumental jams in 13/8, they focus more on atmosphere and song development. The longer tracks here have excellent pacing and structure, never feeling their length at all. The opening cuts of the title track and 'Elizabeth' have a brilliant energy that runs through them, mostly due to the tight rhythm section, particularly the pounding and intense drumming. The aforementioned pair of 'Lost Our Faith' and 'How Long We Wait' have a similar energy, never once dying down, even between the tracks.

The rhythm section of drummer Joey Waters and bassist Chris Tackett dominate a lot of this record, creating some excellent jams in the album. The opening title track is a mostly instrumental affair, aside from a couple of verses sung through a megaphone, and the grooves that they get into with the instrumentals remind me quite a bit of Russian Circles' heavier moments, particularly the drumming style and the fact that the majority of the bass on the record is played with a pick. The picked bass also gets some quite Muse-sounding parts coming through in the instrumental sections, particularly the explosive finale of the ballad 'To Love is to Leave', which sees them leave behind all 'ballad' connotations of the track, with some more epic vocals coming through a megaphone, and a driving bass riff in 7/4 that dominates the last few minutes, one of the few moments in the album when an odd signature is used.

Aside from controlling the music through his excellent vocals (and great work on layering said vocals), frontman Matt Page also dominates the music through his guitar work, regularly combining multiple layers of guitar to create a fantastic atmosphere. Page's guitar style has been regularly compared to David Gilmour in terms of his drawn-out and atmospheric soloing, but there is certainly some modern influence to his playing, most notably the influence from shoegaze and use of tremolo-picking in his solos, as well as in the layering under the verses. To continue to praise it, 'Elizabeth' has some excellent tremolo in the intro, adding to the great tension created by the rhythm section. Utopic's final solo also has some great use of it, and combined with the rumbling basslines, begins to sound a bit like something that Matthew Bellamy would do in a solo. But although Page is certainly a talented guitarist, often reminding me of Circus Maximus' Mats Haugen in his grasp of melody and motifs, a few of the solos here do tend to drag or feel a bit forced and unnecessary. Possibly my only critique of 'Elizabeth' is how the second solo comes in, feeling rather jarring and killing the mood of the chorus a bit. It later develops into a rather fantastic instrumental jam, but a few of these solos could benefit from being cut in half. Similarly, a few of the longer tracks begin to drag on a bit, although I've praised the pacing in 'Elizabeth' and 'How Long We Wait' a track like 'It Must Taste Good', while it holds an excellent melody and great driving riff, after about 5 minutes it begins to get a bit samey and feel tired. 'The Name You Fear' is probably the weakest track on here as well, so it does feel like the album has a bit of a dip in the middle, until the final section of 'I Know What You Are' comes flying in.

But if the middle of the album has any sort of dip in quality, from the ending of 'I Know What You Are' out, the band firmly cements that they haven't run out of steam at all, with four great tracks coming after. The crescendo finish leading into 'Fist to Face' reminds me a lot of Anathema in its chord progressions, especially 'The Lost Child' from Weather Systems. 'Fist to Face' is the shortest full track here, but contains one of the best choruses the band have made, strong and memorable. But the real star of this second half is the 9-and-a-half-minute epic 'How Long We Wait', as well as its tense two-minute introductory track 'Lost Our Faith', and I feel the songs would never work separately. Opening with a deliciously melodic riff on top of paced drumming, I'm thrown back to the glory of 'Elizabeth', but with far more of a positive vibe, and happier emotions. Like 'Elizabeth', the energy in this track is phenomenal, and during the first two minutes the band run through a montage of the best vocal hooks they could come up with, never once dying down, until a Floydian atmospheric break comes in, followed by an absolutely spinechilling scream. At this point, the track feels straight out of a Muse record, but we all know that they would never have the ambition or self-belief to do something this epic. If I have one nitpick with this track, it's that I kind of wish the lead riff from the intro came back in and they drilled out another chorus (basically just because it's too good to only have two repeats), since the ending ambience feels a bit empty after such an epic, although it makes an excellent transition into 'Ashes Fall'.

Heretics isn't just the best post-prog album of the last few years, or even the best progressive rock album of the last few years. In my ears, this is the best album since July of 2012, full stop. And on top of that, I feel this may be the greatest album in the post-prog genre to date in my ears. Or at least up there with Rhythm, Chord & Melody and Sound Awake. Any real problems I have with this album are pretty minimal and easy to look past. I think the number of solos on the album could have been split at half at least, and the ones included could be a bit more focused, and as I mentioned before, the middle of the album starts to drag a bit, and I'm sure the album would benefit from being a bit shorter and more focused. It may not be perfect, and it is in no sense set in stone as my album of the year spoiler: click to read, but it's certainly the best I've heard in a while, and a stellar addition to any collection. Don't miss this.

9.0

Originally written for my Facebook page/blog: www.facebook.com/neoprogisbestprog

Such an intriguing band name for us P.Dick fans, a wonderful cover, being a trio (who doesn't love power rock trios?), big fuss around the band's quality and free to download: Dedicating some hours to ''Heretics'' seemed a very easy decision. The big question was one: Is the fuss justified? Have no doubt about it!

The first thing to notice is that DTES sounds like a super group. Their music shows such maturity, confidence and personality that would suit an arena-filling band and not three guys from Lexington, KY, in their second album, which is distributed for free. This characteristic in sound, songwriting and performance is so intense that immediately distinguishes DTES from the pile of newcoming bands. This is material for major labels and worldwide promotion.

DTES claims to be a progressive rock band and I love them for that. The truth is there are only a few prog elements to be found. I would describe them mostly as an incredibly artistic hard rock band. Their sound is massively electroacoustic, very unique in style and with a wide range of influences. Some Floyd and Genesis here and there, mainstream 80's rock (U2, Police), some alternative in the vein of early Pearl Jam, post rock (due to the extended use of atmospheres from guitar delays and reverbs) and certainly a lot of blues, especially in the guitar solos. At some moments, the melodic parts of straight hard rock bands like Indian rockers The Cult and Warrior Soul came to my mind. The band infiltrates all these elements (and more) into a new sound but what I love the most is this sound's mood: it's powerful and energetic, commercial without being cheesy, major but not too happy, minor but not too melancholic. I found some relevance with the good albums of Dredg, not in sound but in vibes.

All compositions are built around Matt Page's charismatic voice. If a band's success depends mostly on its singer, than DTES really have a great chance. His voice is different, filled with colorful tones, good old fashioned rocking clarity and well built technique. Sometimes, he resembles Jeff Buckley, in the way that he uses his vibrato at high notes and this is a very rarely-given compliment. His guitar playing is equally amazing, perfectly filling all the gaps and setting the stage for the fantastic vocal lines. Joey Waters & Chris Tackett deliver a more straightforward and rough sound in their rhythm section, trying to achieve excellence through simplicity. And they generally do. I also find it impressive that the band never uses heavy stereotypes and remains focused at its own vision, at all times.

There is not one mediocre moment here. All songs are of the same quality level, if you like one you will like all and I guess the opposite is true, too. So, I find no use in describing them separately. There are five epic songs longer than 8 minutes but I have to say that my favorites are ''Utopic'' and ''Fist to face'', two shorter tracks with magical melodies that hooked in my brain for weeks.

What DTES should do, in my opinion, in order to achieve even greater heights: Maybe a bit shorter duration than 75 minutes or a bit longer instrumental parts. A bit less dirty production. Wider use of other instruments (as Gazpacho did) would add grandeur to an already very colourful music.

Summing up: rock music of extreme quality from an unexpected band, music that every progster should find at least enjoyable. I think that DTES can achieve wonders artistically and, given the right resources/promotion, commercially too. Prog community should embrace and support them by all means, this is a band that can make us all proud. ''Heretics'' will definitely be on my top-10 list for 2014. Eagerly waiting to see what's next.

87/100. 4 electric stars!

Greetings ProgArchivers!

This is my first review so let me start by saying I've been following this site for a long time and THANKS for all the great music reviews! I've discovered a lot of awesome music as a result.

Anyway, HERETICS has inspired me to submit this review because I truly believe this album is special and required listening for any prog or rock fan! The blend of creative melodies mixed with a powerful rhythm section makes for a unique and invigorating sound! This album really should be experienced in its entirety because the tracks blend so well with each other, but yet each track has something that separates it from the other. Also the lyrics are deep and the singer uses melody and phrasing in very creative ways that really drew me in. This album has moved me personally and I haven't been this excited for a new band since I first heard Deloused in the Comatorium by The Mars Volta.

DTES has soul and substance which is lacking somewhat in the music I hear these days!

If you want just a taste I'd recommend just starting out with the first two tracks "Heretics" and "Elizabeth", but if you are willing to take the plunge and listen to the entire album you will be rewarded with the beautifully powerful "Ashes Fall".

Oh what an interesting cover. Here we can study a female saint and many black and white photos of now dead people, only women as it seems. The name of the record is "Heretics" and the band is from the United States and is called Dream the Electric Sleep. It is the band's second studio album and it's totally new.

Well, sometimes the music reaches the heart so emergant so nothing else than five stars would be inappropriate. Your feelings in one way hide you from the more logical truth. But why shouldn't they. Music is art and art is not objective. On the other side there is also music that you find so wrong and non-appealing that you want to protest and just give the record one star. This is perhaps an example of the latest. I have listened to the record carefully twice and I don't have any interest in what I hear. I would also be so rude and say that the squeaky and smoothed vocals together with the alternative rock music just make me irritated and my ears want to cry out their need for something more traditional.

Obviously this is a record that people love and perhaps you should give it a try, especially if you like "modern" music, I'm not sure I do that, I am a prog conservative. I had hard to hear similarities with other prog bands. Neither did I hear a song which I liked on this album or did I hear anything unique. So sorry, this wasn't in my taste!

Some of the best music I've heard all year. The music has an energy and urgency and excitement that is rarely felt in modern studio music. Great songwriting, great musicianship, great vocals, songs that pack a wallop yet are filled with many unexpected twists and turns. Heretics puts up some awesome, but not over-the-top, walls of sound. If there is a drawback to some of it, it's that it often sounds and feels too derivative of the music of U2--including the vocal stylings sounding like U2 lead singer, Bono. Otherwise, this is, start to finish, an exciting album of high-energy rock. I have a feeling that Heretics will win over a lot of new fans for this group of American alt/prog rockers. There are some very special songs on this album, especially the title song opener, "Heretics" (4:51) (10/10), which takes The Beatles and King Crimson to places they never dreamed of going! It opens with powerful chords that hook you in from the opening riffs. The closer, "Ashes Fall" (8:08) (9/10), is another stunner, this time for the continuous list of "waiting"s heart-wrenchingly read by a female voice.

Favorite songs: "Heretics;" the U2 War-ish and doves-like "Elizabeth" (8:22) (9/10); the doves-like "Utopic" (6:38) (8/10); the brief folk-with-Bono-ish "Lost Our Faith" (2:06) (8/10); the full-out U2 sounding "How Long We Wait" (9:29) (8/10), and, of course; "Ashes Fall."

Solid four star album of high quality, highly creative, highly detailed music.

When my wife and I started dating 17 years ago, I sent her a mix tape of some of my favorite music - can you tell we were kids in the 70's! One of the songs was "Goodnight Elisabeth" by a great band that's in no way prog. I had no idea that it was one of my wife's favorite names, and that we would end up naming our teenage daughter Elizabeth. The point is that I might be a little biased when it comes to the CD I'm reviewing, Dream The Electric Sheep's HERETICS! Luckily, there are a lot of legitimate reasons that I think highly of this album.

More often than not, what I'm looking for in the music I listen to is something different. I want to hear elements combined in an interesting way, that I haven't heard a dozen times before. This band's influences are apparent, and thoroughly discussed elsewhere. DTES definitely aren't a clone of other bands in the broad progressive universe. It's possibly their greatest selling point. Another excellent thing about Dream the Electric Sheep is Matt Page's singing. He has a terrific voice and technique. He doesn't sing each song the same way.

My favorite songs, like those of my fellow reviewers, are at either end of the album. But truly, there isn't a song here I don't like. I only have two minor complaints. The first is that some of the songs overstay their welcome. This is probably an occupational hazard of post-rock inspired music, which tends to sound superficially repetitive. However, repeated listening to these 11 tracks reveals details I hadn't noticed before. The second is that for a concept album about specific influential women (read DTES' Bandcamp page), the lyrics are pretty vague. Like I've already stated, these are very minor reservations. I'm giving HERETICS 4 stars, even though they stole my daughter's name!

DREAM THE ELECTRIC SLEEP are a band out of the state of Kentucky. Man I haven't been through that state since I was a kid. Anyway, the album clocks in at well over 70 minutes and features modern sounding vocals both of which are a negative for me. Still, over time I have grown to really appreciate this album. Even after my first listen it was clear that this was a talented band with some incredible songs. The music is quite heavy at times, I really dig the rhythm section but we get a lot of variety as well.

"Heritics" is an instrumental that has an excellent heavy sound to it. I like the vocal melodies later on as well. "Elizabeth" isn't as heavy and we get vocals before a minute. Nice chunky bass and it kicks into a higher gear before 2 minutes but contrasts will continue. A calm before 4 minutes with reserved vocals before it kicks back in. A cool PORCUPINE TREE-like atmospheric section ends it. "Utopic" is a top three song for me. Beautiful acoustic guitar to start but bass, drums and more arrive quickly as it builds. Vocals follow and the song settles each time for the chorus which is gorgeous. Nice guitar solo after 5 minutes. "To Love Is To Leave" is ballad-like with reserved vocals to start but it turns fuller with heavy bass lines before 1 1/2 minutes and these contrasts will continue. A tasteful guitar solo 3 1/2 minutes in. It turns intense after 5 minutes. So good! A calm ends it. "The Name You Fear" is catchy and heavy with some cool vocal melodies. The bass is huge. Nice guitar solo after 4 minutes and later on as well. Check out the drum work as well. "It Must Taste Good" opens with faint guitar experssions as a melodic picked guitar arrives but both are drowned out by heaviness. Sounds like an early nineties Alternative song to be honest. I like the vocal melodies too. Themes are repeated.

"I Know What You Are" features acoustic guitars before drums, vocals and more take over in a dramatic way. Atmosphere only as it calms down to a whisper then almost spoken vocals arrive. It turns loud before 4 1/2 minutes and this majestic section will stay to the end. "Fist To Face" is another top three for me. Love the guitar melodies that are featured throughout. A full sound kicks in quickly. Vocal melodies late. Great tune. "Lost Our Faith" is a short tune with what sounds like two acoustic guitars and reserved vocals before it turns heavier around 1 1/2 minutes in. "How Long We Wait" has this feel good guitar line to start, it turns fuller quickly. This is uptempo as the vocals join in. It settles back 2 1/2 minutes in then turns even quieter at 3 minutes. It's building as the guitar lights it up. Another calm before 4 1/2 minutes before it builds again. "Ashes Fall" is my other top three. What a way to end this record. I like the menacing guitar and heavy duty sound here. The vocal melodies are cool, they really use them to great affect on this album. Vocals before a minute and these guys are kicking ass. A calm at 4 minutes with lots of atmosphere. Sampled voices can be heard then the vocals return before 5 minutes. There's a great PORCUPINE TREE-like instrumental section after 6 minutes then those sampled voices are back to end it.

Just an excellent effort from these boys who live where the grass is blue and horses rule the sports world.

US band DREAM THE ELECTRIC SLEEP (DTES from now on) was formed back in 2009, and from their base in Lexington, Kentucky, they have explored their particular brand of progressive rock on two full-length albums so far. "Heretics" is the most recent of these, self-released by the band in early 2014.

DTES comes across as a modern band on most levels, and a band that doesn't look all that much backwards in time for inspiration either. Familiar sounding details appear here and there, vocals similar to both Bono and Thom Yorke, Rush style harder edged but light toned riffs and soloing, post rock textures and the nervous moods of bands like Radiohead. With a few possible nods towards Pink Floyd and Porcupine Tree to boot. But while many details sound familiar, the end result really doesn't compare directly to any other artist I can recall. Progressive rock with a foundation in the music of today if you like, incorporating select details from multiple styles and traditions into a new whole. A band and a CD that merit an inspection by those intrigued by that description, and one I'd guess should interest those who enjoy their early '80s Rush just as much as late 90's Radiohead.

A power trio from Kentucky U S that has floored many reviewers with this dynamic album "Heretics". I was drawn to Dream the Electric Sleep for two reasons; I'm a Blade Runner fan and love the novel of Philip K Dick, and second, the album has hit the top 10 lists of many a collaborator I discovered. I wanted to find out what all the fuss was about so with the magic of Internet technology was able to hear this album before the deadline of top 10 votes. After hearing it the album immediately went on my list too. It is a fantastic album with some awesome tracks. The metal guitar sound is highlighted by great vocals and wonderful rhythms. The melodies are catchy and there are some complex time sigs throughout.

The highlights are Heretics, Elizabeth, To Love Is To Leave, It Must Taste Good, I Know What You Are, How Long We Wait and Ashes Fall.

It is a well produced album from Matt, Joey and Chris with a soundscape that sits somewhere between Anathema and Porcupine Tree at times. I like this album because it never gets pretentious but has a genuine quality ignited by fire and passion on every track. There are done real emotional moments and in places the lyrics reflect on the struggles of life and coping with pain and fear.

Overall this Dream of Electric Sleep album comes recommended as one of the highlights of the year.