There is a Dream

With demos like these, 'Falling Into Infinity' had the potential to be the greatest Dream Theater album. Sadly, the castrated label-influenced final version simply does not share the glory of it's demos. Dream Theater had been sitting on the fence waiting to record this album for three years, and in this time, they had developed enough songs to fill up two discs! However, the label rejected the idea of releasing a double disc album, and the group had to pick and choose which songs to put on the record. With this official bootleg release, fans could at long last hear the songs as they were meant to be heard. This is without a doubt the best of these releases, because of all the alternate and unreleased songs…

This 5xCD box set from Cherry Red offers a compelling look at shoegaze's prime era. Still in a Dream takes a wide trawl approach to its genre, which has upsides and downsides. As with Rhino’s goth box A Life Less Lived, shoegaze is generously interpreted to include antecedents and formative influences, which bulks up the quality.

Dream 6 is actually the original name for the band that would become Concrete Blonde, comprised of future Blonde members Johnette Napolitano and James Mankey (Michael Murphy handles drumming). They released this six-song EP in France four years before their self-titled debut and there's nothing very remarkable about it…

Riverside are one of the most universally acclaimed bands on this site, with all four of their album releases to date comfortably achieving in excess of 4 stars. It is perhaps surprising then that this is the band's first DVD release, and thus the first chance most of us have had to witness them live…

This is an album of modern commercial, radio friendly, finely crafted rock n roll / country tunes. Do not expect wild sounding rockabilly or a pastiche of 50’s rock n roll. Bo and his team have cleverly put together a collection that while it remains steeped in the roots of the rock n roll genre it gathers influence from all of the many and varied elements that make up the 50+ year history of this music. Then they add a dash of modern sounding country, sixties pop, etc stir and shake it all together and produce a sound that is highly listenable with songs that sound fresh and firmly of the now. Kicking off with the strong Hangin’ On, an instantly catchy country rock tune the album then tears into I Like It Like That, a straight out rock n roll number with a catchy sing along car radio chorus and a great guitar sound.