Customer Reviews

Dream Harder

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

 

 

It is now several years since I first purchased this disk - and with the perspective of histroy it is easier to put into some kind of context.

It was a few years between "Room-to-Roam" and this album and thus when it first appeared it was grabbed at with some delight -Mike Scott had actually put out another album! The first few listens were hugely disappointing - after his definitive "Big Music" and journey into fun "Irish Folk/Pop" this turn in the road was, at first, a disappointment. It was relegated to the unlistened to pile for a few weeks. Then out of curiosity I put it on again one day - suddenly it grabbed me and I really began to like it. Skip track one - and just relax into the rest of it - it is simply fun tuneful pop - don't even bother thinking about it! Who wants to get intellectual about the Waterboys anyhow!

A stand-alone Waterboys' album - but certainly one that should be in the collection.

"Dream Harder" simply put,is a metaphysical masterpeice of soaring highs juxtaposed to an often pensive,thoughtful lyrical bank.The first time I heard the waterboys(song"The hole of the moon")they sounded superficially like a New Wave Simon and Garfunkel,an interesting marriage to say the least.So I went out and purchased"This is the Sea",more than just plesantly suprised I loved the bands unity of Irish folk rock set to intelligent well written verse.That's exactly what you get hear,this time the vacilating subject matter involves anything from Jimi Hendrix to the ancient Celtic pagan god(I presume)Pan.Hey,these guys even did a song sung to one of W.B.Y old poems!

Dream Harder is a transition for Mike Scott and The Waterboys, a move beyond their heavy celtic phase and into something sounding a little more like pop. The hit single, The Glastonbury Song, is the heart of the album. Bursting with creativity and imagination, the song can only look forward. The New Life in a Spiritual City is clearly in sight here for The Waterboys. Their creative influences come to them in visions, and the "boys" introduce us to C.S. Lewis, Jimi Hendrix, and the pagan god Pan. Their music soars and, as always, the lyrics are poetry.

Pop music: what a fickle, bizarre universe. Just think of all the beautiful songs you have loved and forgotten. They lived for a moment in your excited consciousness, and then faded away.

How many bands must come and go before the perfect song is written? Well, we all have a few candidates.

I think Mike Scott captured it in "The Return Of Pan." It is elemental, rambunctious, Druidic, Bacchanalian, headbanging, and just plain cool. How many rock songs compare Greek legend with Christianity? Yeah, go ahead, start counting.

I am reluctant to put on this music. "The Return Of Pan" always gets me amped up and dancing like some stupid hippie. Okay, maybe I am a stupid hippie.

Thank you, Mike, for reminding me of what I knew before.

Relocating to New York, Mike Scott left behind his bog standard infatuation with Irish music and returned with this cracker that pushes a barrage of rock guitars and life affirming songs to the fore. Opener, 'The New Life', epitomised his new approach, whilst the wide-eyed rush of 'Glastonbury Song' and the mystical goofiness of 'Spiritual City', hinted at a new found spirituality. There's variety aplenty here, whether it be the country waltz of 'Corn Circles' or the feverish psychedelia of 'The Return of Jimi Hendrix'. Scott's an endearingly eccentric character with a vivid imagination. Keep on dreaming.

The Waterboys are among my favorite bands, so my review is biased, take that into account when you read this!

On this, the final album of The Waterboys, Mike Scott delivers some amazing songs. Critics have heaped a lot of flak on this album, very unjustly in my opinion. By this time, The Waterboys were essentially Mike Scott and session musicians. So much so that Scott dropped the group name and went solo for his next album. But back to Dream Harder: I have always felt Mike Scott's lyrics. They always describe the world with wide-eyed wonder and are very heartfelt. I bought this album when it was first released; I was a grad student going through some very hard times. I still cry when _The New Life_ plays through my speakers, especially the part that says: "I've burned my bridges and I'm free at last. All my pains are in the past." The best song about moving forward, not looking back. _The Return Of Pan_ is one of those wide-eyed wonder songs that contains one of the most soul-wrenching guitar solos I know of. _Glastonbury Song_ is very spiritual and _Good News_ is a tremendous closer. These four songs are all of 10 star, stratospheric quality. Too bad that the rest is mediocre at best. But these four songs are so good that words just cannot describe them.

Opinions are so diverse and that is great. I love Mike Scott and his Waterboys for a lot of personal reasons. Mike Scott is a genius any way you slice it but his output does not reflect all that. Some of his albums I do not care for while others seem to think they are wonderful. This is the Sea, for example, has such a loud sound but I find it harsh not very melodic. The whole album is less of a thrill than, let's say, Fisherman's Blues. I love Fisherman's Blues! For the money is an exciting and beautiful album. Dream Harder starts with a Bang, with the first 3 songs are just plain awesome. Then, sadly for me, they dropped completely and becomes tedious and uninviting until perhaps song #12 which once again makes the album take flight. So 3 Stars is what it gets and after that album nothing especial, really, until their last one when once again the quality of this great group can be appreciated. I love the cover of Dream Harder and wished it would have been better, but if wishes were horses beggars would be riding!

mike scott and company have always been and eclectic group of individuals
and mike scott as usual changing direction is in familiar territory.
a great album full of energy ,poetry ,heart and soul.
with such masterpieces as new life,glastonbury song,winter winter,love and death and my personal top 5 song on the whole catalog of the waterboys "good news"

It took the waterboys a long time to create something new but it was well worth the wait. The excitement when this album was released was intense at my home. I tried to explain it to my wife before the album came out-she'd only listened to the vinyl records a few times. They caught her imagination and now she too is hooked.

My only exposure to Mike Scott and the Waterboys was in the form of the two Celtic influenced romps, "Fisherman's Blues" and "Room to Roam." So, when I tried to listen to the over-produced, cliché ridden, New Age pomp, feel-good, self-indulgent schlock that passes for music here, I was stunned.

"Dream Harder" ranks up there as one of the all-time most annoying albums I've ever heard. No tired, overwrought, or slick contrivance was spared in recording this utterly unlistenable mess. And that doesn't even touch on lyrics here. You would be hard-pressed to pen stuff with more of a cringe factor than these words:

Corn circles
Mysterious symbols in the fields
Corn circles
Mysterious symbols in the fields
No one knows - are they phony
Or maybe are they real?

Or these:
Winter winter on the way
bitter cold she bring
Winter winter on the way
hard and deadly thing . . .

Dream harder, indeed!