{"id":11980,"date":"2021-01-04T10:08:46","date_gmt":"2021-01-04T16:08:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/?p=11980"},"modified":"2026-05-06T15:11:41","modified_gmt":"2026-05-06T20:11:41","slug":"album-review-smokescreens-a-strange-dream","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/2021\/01\/04\/album-review-smokescreens-a-strange-dream\/","title":{"rendered":"Album Review :: Smokescreens :: A Strange Dream"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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by Isiah Schellenberg<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Los Angeles-based band Smokescreens newest album A Strange Dream<\/em> captures what a catchy jangle pop record can be. Similar to Smith Westerns, Real Estate, and the Velvet Underground, the instrumentation on these songs has a very warm tone all together. All the parts blend and compliment one another from the clean jangle guitar leads to strummed acoustic guitars. With a similar sound to their last release Used to be Yesterday<\/em>, this group of songs has a more refined and cleaner sound.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

The opening track, \u201cFork In the Road,\u201d sets what you can hear from the album and shows how great the guitar work on these songs is. It starts with a high energy riff then the drums come right along with a washed-out layer of synth to follow right through.  Smokescreens\u2019 song \u201cNighttime Skies \u201cis the fourth song which has a change of pace and is one of the slower and most simple songs. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the only acoustic track, there is a light tambourine sound that rings throughout and Beach Boys style harmonies in the chorus. The lyrics on A Strange Dream<\/em> come off as lighthearted but still very thought out. On their song, \u201cStreets of Despair\u201d the listener experiences the perspective of a character looking at a situation they have never been in before or know. \u201cIn a rich new town, where you can be living the life of luxury, other people might not have luck, you\u2019ll never know what it’s like to be stuck.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Then there’s \u201cI Only Love You,”\u00a0 the most similar sounding to the Velvet Underground, with its spoken word vocals. \u201cWhen the routine bites hard and the jokes have gone too far\/ when the world brings you down\/ I\u2019ll be the one who’s coming round.\u201d This song has a narrator showing their reassurance to someone who is going through a difficult time. Then going back to \u201cNight Time Skies\u201d where it’s talking about the change from day to night and finding more joy in the night. With a run time of only 23 minutes, these eight songs are really able to showcase a lot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

https:\/\/smokescreensla.bandcamp.com\/album\/a-strange-dream<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Isiah Schellenberg Los Angeles-based band Smokescreens newest album A Strange Dream captures what a catchy jangle pop record can be. Similar to Smith Westerns, Real Estate, and the Velvet Underground, the instrumentation on these songs has a very warm tone all together. All the parts blend and compliment one another from the clean jangle […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11980","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11980","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11980"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11980\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11982,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11980\/revisions\/11982"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11980"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11980"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11980"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}