ALL IS DREAM

Absolutely fantastic to see MR added to the Progressive Archive. They fit the genre beautifully. Strings, avante garde arrangements, totally surreal at times too. All Is Dream is the best album on offer, although I have yet to hear the highly rated Boces. The album starts with ' The Dark is Rising', a song named from Susan Cooper's book of the same title. If you have read the book, more for youngsters, you will understand the 'spookiness' of the whole realm. A great fantasy novel. Mercury Rev set the tone with this beautifully orchestrated song. Donahue's high pitched vocals perfectly in tune with the backdrop anthem song. The next song gains strength with " Tides Of The Moon'. This is more complex and quite hypnotic as MR weave in and out. It has great peaks and vallies as the music, richly dances to and fro.A previous reviewer dislikes ' lincoln's Eyes' but for me this is the highpoint of the album, stretching the Rev's psychotic, manic tendencies to it's fragile best. Persevere with this track as near the end it becomes hauntingly beautiful as it finally leaps into the epic ' Nite and Fog'. ' Little Rhymes' follows. It is well executed and relates to psyhedelic tripping after too many pills!! and is so fairytale like in it's delivery you know these guys have been feasting on mushrooms in a dark forest somewhere. Perhaps this is why I rate Mercury Rev so highly is because they constantly enter the surrealistic world that prog started off as doing. It is fresh sounding too and totally unique.' Hercules' is a fine ending to All Is Dream and for anyone desperately looking for some new sound that is creative, original and near perfect then start with this album. A modern day masterpiece release 11/9/2001, a ray of light when the world was enshrouded in darkness. Irony for sure.