Dreamend, Maybe We’re Making God Sad and Lonely

This is heady, trippy stuff from a band that I know absolutely nothing about. But sometimes not knowing anything about a group is better than getting a CD in the mail from an artist that you really love. When there are no expectations, it’s a lot easier to write a review that is honest. At least, that sounds good at the moment, don’t you think?

With Maybe We’re Making God Sad and Lonely, Dreamend get right to the business of transporting you back in time to a place where bands like The Chameleons plied their craft with reckless, reverberated abandon. It’s all about going really slow and creating an aura around the melody so that it seeps into your subconscious like warm water through your fingers. According to the liner notes, this was all done pretty much live in the band’s rehearsal space, a setting that, to my mind, really captures the mood. When bands go into a recording studio and try to recreate the sound that they’ve been used to hearing during their practices, they are always surprised by how different and sterile the sound is.

Great-sounding records usually come after thousands of dollars and lots of hours have been invested. But there’s a lot to be said for Dreamend and for their decision to put themselves down on tape in the rawest form possible. This medium instantly adds a natural ambiance that cannot be created in a studio under any circumstances. And if you don’t believe me, listen to any of the original Motown stuff, back when it was pretty much one microphone in one room with ten musicians playing all at once. It’s obvious that Dreamend are pretty far removed from those R&B pioneers of the early ’60s, but the recording blueprint is the same.

If you have the ability to sit still in a dark room and listen to the world breathe and exhale around you, I think you’ll like this record. Put it on and paint something, write some poetry, or just close your eyes and make something up. Fans of My Morning Jacket and Built to Spill will find a lot to like here if they’re willing to be a little less excited than usual.