The War On Drugs - Lost In The Dream

Album download included

"This is the War On Drugs' most lustrous, intricately detailed and beautifully rendered record to date." Best New Music 8.8 — Pitchfork

"The War On Drugs make archetypal road-trip music: Shimmering, steady, gritty as pavement and open as the sky." — Rolling Stone

"One of 2014's truly great records. The perfect American road trip." 9/10 — NME

The War On Drugs, the Philadelphia-based project of Adam Granduciel, presents their third full-length album, the beautifully sweeping Lost In The Dream, via Secretly Canadian. Written and recorded over two-plus years in Philadelphia, North Carolina, New York and New Jersey, following almost two years of nonstop touring in support of 2011's Slave Ambient, Lost In The Dream is the outstanding presentation of Granduciel's progression and growth as a songwriter, performer, and producer. It is an immense listen to be absorbed and discovered now and for decades to come.

Around the release of the 2011 breakthrough Slave Ambient, Adam Granduciel spent the bulk of two years on the road, touring through progressively larger rock clubs, festival stages and late-night television slots. As these dozen songs shifted and grew beyond what they'd been in the studio, The War on Drugs became a bona fide rock 'n' roll band.

That essence drives Lost In The Dream, a 10-song set produced by Granduciel and longtime engineer Jeff Zeigler. In the past, Granduciel built the core of songs largely by himself. But these tunes were played and recorded by the group that had solidified so much on the road: Dave Hartley, (his favorite bassist in the world), who had played a bit on The War on Drugs' 2008 debut Wagonwheel Blues, and pianist Robbie Bennett, a multi-instrumentalist who contributed to Slave Ambient. This unit spent eight months bouncing between a half-dozen different studios that stretched from the mountains of North Carolina to the boroughs of New York City. Only then did Granduciel — the proudly self-professed gearhead, and unrepentant perfectionist — add and subtract, invite guests and retrofit pieces. He sculpted these songs into a musical rescue mission, through and then beyond personal despair and anxiety. Lost In The Dream represents the trials of the trip and the triumphs of its destination.

"I wanted there to be a singular voice, but I wanted it to be a project of great friends. Everyone in the band cares about it so much," Granduciel says. "That is the crux of it--growing up, dealing with life, having close friends, helping each other get by. That is what the record's all about."

As such, these tunes reveal a careful and thrilling reinvention of the band's sound. The signature meld of long tones and scattershot layers still stands, with phantom drum machines and organ lines dotting the musical middle distance all across Lost In The Dream.

 

Side 1

1. Under The Pressure

2. Red Eyes

3. Suffering

Side 2

4. An Ocean In Between The Waves

5. Disappearing

Side 3

6. Eyes To The Wind

7. The Haunting Idle

8. Burning

Side 4

9. Lost In The Dream

10. In Reverse

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