Customer Reviews

Dream Academy

5 star:		(17)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

In the middle of an era dominated by the likes of Duran Duran, Eurythmics, Def Leppard, and Prince, came a group that was kind of an anomaly to the mainstream of the 1980's. For one thing, the instrumentation of The Dream Academy defies the usual guitar, bass, drums format, it's a melange of something undescribable, with elements of classical, jazz, and acoustic sounds, and much of it deals with the bleakness of the post-industrial urban world and the crushing loneliness and bitter travails of life, all with a lyrical and poetic base.

From the bleak blowing wind effect, the gentle strains of guitars, Kate St. John's oboe, and that famed "Ah hey ma ma ma" chorus, comes the single that sadly relegated them to one-hit wonder status, "Life In A Northern Town." The lyrics give a bleak picture of the town and the sad departure of the storyteller in the song.

"The Edge Of Forever" is a longing romantic song about how we miss the closeness and security we needed as children but not given as adults. Singer Nick Laird-Clowes asks at one time, "When you were young, did you ever fall down, graze your knee and want to run to someone? 'Cause now that you're older, I've been falling down, I want to run to someone, but there's nobody around." It's nice and lyrical in the verses, which explodes in a crescendo with keyboards and cello in the chorus. This is the song played at the end of Ferris Bueller's Day Off when Matthew Broderick and Mia Sara kiss and part.

"(Johnny) New Light" details the loss of innocence and a longing for a more natural life, and what happens when technology in the form of tractors make harvesting the wheat easier. "We have nothing else to do" Laird-Clowes and the backup singers sing towards the end.

"In Places On The Run" is a mellow, dreamy, and poetic piece, about walking through coloured fields, bazaars, watching flickering stars in the warm night, with great accompaniment by the assorted percussion and St. John's oboe and Laird-Clowes' strumming guitar whose tempo increases whenever he starts off with "What a dream I had" line beginning each verse.

"This World" is a wry social commentary about a lonely unemployed man who has to steal to make it, a girl trying to find company in a pub, and city elders who overreact to a beating. The chorus varies but its sober message is: "This is for the misunderstood lonely people/living in the world and getting nowhere/something always just goes wrong/why should they try to hold on to the dreams of this world/where they never quite belonged?" Another of my theme songs. Probably the second best song here after "Northern Town."

"Bound To Be" has a bouncy funk synth beat and features backing vocals by Caron Wheeler (Soul II Soul) and Sam Brown, Joe "A Picture Of You" Brown's daughter.

"The Love Parade" was the album's second single with dreamy vocals by St. John and how a summer love serenade can take hold of even those married for many years, i.e. extramarital love, in the case of this song, the woman.

With Dave Gilmour's acoustic guitar and Peter "R.E.M." Buck's Rickenbacker, "The Party" highlight the stifling discomfort, ego-destruction, and loneliness faced when the girl one brings to a party spends the night dancing with someone else. "I open up the window to get some ventilation, try to break away from the intellectual starvation" is why I hate parties. Small bits of "Northern Town", "The Edge Of Forever" and "In Places On The Run" done towards the fade. There's a classical aura with St. John's oboe and a nice string section.

What makes life worth is to "reach out for that one dream in your life" sings Laird-Clowes in "One Dream." What prevents that is being at war with yourself. Key lyric: "I woke up to find/life was just leading me on that's all/then I found out that I could reach it all." Some nice trumpet by David Defries accompanies this hopeful number.

This album was produced by lead singer Laird-Clowes and Pink Floyd's Dave Gilmour. And the instruments used make them unique in 80's music, especially St. John's oboe, cor anglais, piano accordion, and tenor sax. Things got mellower and with some lighter moments in their followup, the underrated Remembrance Days.

"Life in a Northern Town" swept in like a breath of fresh air during the period when bands like the Thompson Twins and Human League were making dreamy sounding singles. There's a story that Dream Academy singer and writer Nick Laird Clowes, who had been fronting a punkish outfit called The Act, played a chorus for Paul Simon that basically went "Ah hey, ah ma ma ma away ah..." and Simon told him that if he could ever build a song around it, he'd have a hit.

Laird Clowes broke up The Act soon after their one album, "Too Late at 20" which featured bandmate Mark Gilmour, and decided to change directions. He teamed up with Gilbert Gabriel on keyboards and Kate St John on oboe and various other classical instruments to form the Dream Academy. Should Mark Gilmour's name strike you as a bit familiar, it's because he's the brother of Pink Floyd's David Gilmour. That connection was enough to score David Gilmour's participation as Dream Academy's debut producer, and with his help, the atmospheric "The Dream Academy" was created.

Laird-Clowes had found the lyric he wanted to drape that infamous chorus across, an ode to tragic figure Nick Drake. The rest, as they say, is history. "Life in a Northern Town" became a sleeper hit and pulled Dream Academy's debut into both commercial and critical success. It also branded them with one hit wonder status, despite the fact that two other Dream Academy albums were chock full of similar fine songs. On this album alone, there were two other notable singles, in "The Love Parade," and (from the movie "Ferris Beuller's Day Off") the lovely "Edge of Forever." Also worth noting is the appearance of Peter Buck on the near Shakespeareanish tragic "The Party."

It's too bad this CD is out of print, as it certainly deserves better than to be remembered as its single scattered across so may 80's anthologies. "The Dream Academy" is worth looking for in the used stuff, and maybe sometime we will be fortunate enough that Rhino will be kind enough to release their import only greatest hits. For now, the three Dream Academy CD's have a permanent place in my library.

I bought The Dream Academy when it first came out. It is still one of my all-time favorite CDs. I've played it over and over again for 15 years or so and it still sounds great. I couldn't pick a favorite song on this one if I had to.

This album deserves to be on everyone's Top 10 list but I guess it couldn't because it is so hard to find. I am sure almost everyone would have heard of the radio friendly "Life in a Northern Town" (LINT) and it is somehow unfortunate that many could have passed judgement on the whole album based on that one song.

LINT was a one-off song but it certainly wasn't representative of the whole album. And if you were lucky enough to get that album I am sure you too would be blown away like I did by the rest of the songs which are not like LINT at all.

To describe the whole album in one word, I would use "passionate". From the second song onwards, you are drawn into a "dream" world where multilayered arrangements, Nick Laird-Clowes' smooth English accented vocals, lush and sometimes haunting melodies intertwine and wraps you in a hypnotic rhapsody that can only intoxicate or enslave your senses.

This is pop music of the 80's but it is the ultimate and the pinnacle of pop when you realize someone can make simple melodies sound so sweet and so engrossing that your mind will reel in amazement.

Read the other reviews for more details of the songs if you want, but get this album when you can. It is a piece of heaven on earth!

I love the music by Dream Academy, but I have been desperately looking for the instrumental version of "Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want" (from Ferris Bueller's Day Off). I finally found it on an album called "Boutique Chill" - a compilation album sold on amazon for about $17. If you're looking for that version of that song, I thought I'd let everyone know.

They may have been one hit wonders but, as this album demonstrates, Nick Laird-Clowes had a heck of a lot more in him than Life in a Northern Town. This is one of the finest albums of the 80's. Laird-CLowes (who studied composition with Paul Simon)has all but disappeared from the music scene (he reportedly has a new band. Recently he wrote some of the lyrics for the last Gilmour Pink Floyd album).

Laird-Clowes' melodies remind me of Paul McCartney, Andy Partridge, and Brian Wilson. Lyrically he captures the little details that make life click. A pity this fine band never had another hit. Even more of a pity that they only produced three fine albums (a 4th became available with tracks from the hard to find third album. It's a Japanese import Greatest Hits collection well worth having).

If you like The Dream Academy, I also recommend Prefab Sprout. Both use jazzy chord changes, Beatlesque melodies sprinkling them throughout their melodic pop songs. Recommended by Prefab Sprout--Steve McQueen, Jordan (The Comeback) and the latest Andromeda Heights.

This 1985 self-titled debut album from The Dream Academy is a truly incredible work of art. Don't be fooled by their "one-hit wonder" status--their leader, a man named Nick Laird-Clowes, is one of the most fascinating (he's had a mind-blowing personal life) & brilliant artists in history.

Nick was in his late 20s by the time this album was released on Warner Bros., & actually, he'd already put his visionary genius on display on two albums before this, even if barely anyone at all ever noticed. In 1977, his band Alfalpha released their lone album, a self-titled effort, on the EMI label--it's a very mellow, breezy, acoustic-guitar based record (imagine the Dream Academy mixed with America (the group)), & it finds Nick writing songs that have a winning childlike innocence, blissfully celebrating the "simple pleasures" of life, & as well as some tracks that show a hunger to "go far" in the world, yet not feeling there's any great hurry & enjoying the time in between. The album tanked commercially, & Nick proceeded to form another band called The Act (which featured Mark Gilmour, David Gilmour's brother, on guitar). The Act released their lone album "Too Late at 20" in 1981 on Hannibal Records (the album was another commercial bomb), & it was quite a different affair--unlike the laidback Alfalpha album, the Act album is a full throttle rock `n' roll album, & the music reflected Nick`s desperation--Nick was no longer content to just "watch the world go spinning by"--instead, he declared you've got to "get it while you're young". Quite simply, these 2 records are an entirely necessary piece of the Dream Academy legacy, & are easily two of the most criminally overlooked records in history--the Alfalpha record does have some throwaway tracks, but out of its 13 tracks, a majority of them are brilliant, & the Act record, which was written entirely by Nick Laird-Clowes, is a near-flawless masterpiece. If you truly love this Dream Academy record, you really owe it to yourself to hear those 2 albums as well. It's fascinating to hear Nick in those 2 very different contexts & to see how they point the way to The Dream Academy.

This album has a very lush, synthesizer-heavy sound & layered vocal chants. That said, it's easy to see how this record will appeal to fans of Enya, but if those surface aspects are mainly why you like the album, it's likely you won't have any interest at all in the 2 pre-Dream Academy records I just mentioned. It's quite inaccurate to call this a new age record--I think of it more as a singer-songwriter album given an incredibly mesmerizing, pastoral production. The dreamy, atmospheric sound lends itself marvelously to the material--David Gilmour (of Pink Floyd, of course) was brought in, & he ended up co-producing all but one of the tracks on here, & he deserves a lot of credit. The first 8 songs were all written by Nick with keyboardist Gilbert Gabriel (the last 2 tracks are Nick solo compositions), & they had a very special relationship as well. Drum machines are heavily used, but to terrific effect. Likewise, Gilbert's use of synths on here is simply masterful--he uses them to give the album a lush, warm sound that's never bland, grating, or lifeless. Plus, there's a lot of other instrumentation as well--there's lots of sparkling acoustic guitar on here, as well as masterful contributions from Kate St John--she graces the album with oboe, French horn, & saxophone work in all the right places, giving additional beauty to the songs. Also, David Gilmour plays guitar on "Bound To Be", & Peter Buck (of R.E.M.) plays 12-string Rickenbacker on "The Party". The album's sound is breaktaking & unique--to say it has a "generic `80s sound" is totally unfair & inaccurate.

As for the songwriting, it's simply brilliant. Not only is the music itself brilliant, but so are the lyrics, all of which were written by Nick. "Life In A Northern Town" is a wistful eulogy with a chorus chant that's been repeatedly sampled, & it finally gave Nick the hit he so richly deserved, & it's a great album opener, but it's a case where an album's big hit is the mere tip of the iceberg. "The Edge of Forever" is a wonderful, emotional song about lovers drifting apart. "Johnny (New Light)" is a dramatic, deeply moving up tempo track with lyrics about the negative effects that technological advances can have on people. "In Places on the Run" is a beautifully sad recollection of a dream. "Bound To Be" is a propulsive song that captures the thrill of meeting someone you really think might be "the one", & the following song, "Moving On" is a haunting, contemplative song where, to put it very simply, you realize that certain person isn't "the one" after all. "The Love Parade" is another haunting, yet danceable, track about erotic temptation, & the album comes to a rousing, anthemic conclusion with the confident, vividly-detailed story-song "The Party" (which sounds like it could have been a leftover from the Act album)--the track ends with a strongly-flanged reprise of tracks from earlier in the album, & it manages to be shockingly effective. This all ends up making the album's last song, the relatively stripped down & short acoustic ballad "One Dream", feel like a bonus track. Nick's lyrics cut extremely deep--at times, he zips through the lyrics, trying to cram a lot of words into a relatively small amount of space, but he has a way of powerfully "tying things together" with precisely-rendered, dramatic lines, & his gasping, sincere vocals work perfectly & really put the lyrics over. Occasionally the vocal melodies are very minimal, but even that works--the melody of "Life In A Northern Town" gives the song a peaceful gentleness, & the "hanging-around-one-note" melody on the "Baba O'Riley"-esque "This World", a song about junkies, adds an ominous quality. There are lots of great vocal chants & bracing use of effects like the screams on "Life In A Northern Town", & the cash-register sound on "Bound To Be"--the album ends up being thrillingly dramatic without ever sounding forced or obnoxious.

To put it simply, the album works like pure magic, & it's one of the greatest albums ever made. Nick Laird-Clowes, heavily inspired by a long list of artists such as the Beatles, Brian Wilson (whom he would later work with), & Nick Drake, ends up with this strikingly original & brilliant album.

Their follow up album, 1987's "Remembrance Days", is clearly inferior to this one, but it's still pretty darn great in its own right. Their last album, 1990's "A Different Kind of Weather", is a major disappointment despite some great moments. The Dream Academy additionally have some terrific non-album tracks to their credit. Also worth checking out are Kate St John's '90s solo albums "Indescribable Night" & "Second Sight" (which put her own stunning, elegant magic on display), as well as Nick's return to record-making with his solo album "Mona Lisa Overdrive" released under the name Trashmonk (it originally came out in 1999 & was re-released in 2001 with 2 bonus tracks). (Gilbert Gabriel has also kept busy with his Futura Sound project.)

Nick Laird-Clowes is, quite simply, an absolute, criminally-underrated genius, & you can't go wrong with this self-titled 1985 desert-island masterpiece by The Dream Academy.

It is truly a cultural crime of some sort that this album is now out of print in the United States. A wonderful throwback to a more innocent and dramatic time in music and hailing such forefathers as The Beatles, The Byrds and Brian Wilson, this debut album from David Gilmour's pals was a tremendous breath of fresh air released in the middle of a time when most of an entire generation was fixated on top-10 computerized glop and forgetting what real music sounded like. That's the reason, of course, why it didn't sell particularly impressively in the USA... and I just thank God it's still available as an import! Lovely, hypnotic, mesmerizing... I was listening to it in my car just today while driving through redwood forests and mountains with my dog... the music's effect is every bit as wonderful now as it was back then. I read once in an interview with Gilmour that this one won an award for best production, or something like that, and do I ever agree (and Gilmour said something like "It did turn out pretty good, didn't it?" Talk about modest)! Every song lovely, every song heartfelt, and every time I hear "The Party", especially as it swells with its Sgt. Pepper-style orchestral touches near its climax, I get tears in my eyes. Oh yes, and the whole masterpiece closes with a wonderful little accoustic gem called "One Dream", which I have always played for self-encouragement during the past thirteen years whenever I felt like my life was falling apart. Thank you so much for the beautiful music and wonderful memories, guys... and let's hope that one day you will finally get the audience in the USA that you so richly deserve.

Every band should dread producing their high watermark masterpiece with the first single. They are forever tagged and judged by it (a la the undeserved and unwanted 'one-hit wonder' accolade). Especially when that masterpiece and the band's image are out of step with their times. This is the story of the Dream Academy back in 1985.

Apart from the ubiquitous 'Life in a Northern Town' (available on many an 80's compilation), I can point to equally good tracks from the three albums and various B-sides. (You'll only find the latter on original vinyl or an extremely rare fan-produced CD.)

The thing that grabbed me about the first album was the expert use of multiple classical instruments in layered music. The oboes, clarinet, violins, and trumpet etc. added deft accompaniments to the folk guitar and synth playing. The song themes, delivery and overall production made the work into one of those rarities - an album that sounds balanced and complete.

Although I subsequently found out that the 'northern town' in fact referred to Nick Drake's UK hometown of Tamworth in Arden, I will always associate this album with long coach trips up to Scunthorpe, "...all of the work shut down" indeed, as I passed the factories, industrial chimneys and steel mills.

I have more people ask me who sings this CD when they get in my car. Most people have no idea who this excellent group is. The songs just seem to flow together and yet each song remains apart. Is there a better song that nobody has ever heard of than "Love Parade"? This is one of the few CD's in my collection that I can listen to repeatedly.