- see Theater of Eternal
Music for the 1960s experimental music group also known as The
Dream Syndicate.
Dream Syndicate was an
alternative rock band from Los Angeles,
California
active from 1981 to 1989. The band was
associated with the
Paisley
Underground music movement.
History
While
attending the University of California, Davis
, Steve Wynn
and Kendra Smith played together (with
future True West members Russ
Tolman and Gavin Blair) in The Suspects. Moving back home to
Los Angeles, Wynn recorded a single called "15 Minutes" (as in
15 minutes of fame) as his
intended farewell to music. Instead, while rehearsing in a band
called Goat Deity, Wynn met Karl Precoda, who had answered an ad
for a bass player, and the two joined to form a new group, with
Precoda switching to guitar. Smith came to play bass, and brought
in drummer Dennis Duck, who had played in the locally successful
Pasadena-based Human Hands.
Duck suggested the name "The Dream Syndicate" in reference to
Tony Conrad's early 1960s New York
experimental ensemble (better known as the
Theater of Eternal Music), whose
members included
John Cale.
On February 23, 1982, The Dream Syndicate performed its first show
at Club Lingerie in Hollywood. A four-song
EP was recorded in the basement of Wynn's
house and released on his own Down There label, and the band
quickly achieved local notoriety for its often aggressively long,
feedback-soaked improvisations.
Obvious sources were
The Velvet
Underground (the Dream Syndicate could be called early VU
revivalists) and
Television, but
echoes of the
Quicksilver
Messenger Service and
Creedence Clearwater Revival
could also be discerned. "It was an overnight thing," Wynn recalled
of their success. "There was no dues paying. It was very weird, and
it screwed us up in some ways."
The band was signed to
Slash Records,
whose subsidiary
Ruby Records released
its debut and by far best-known album,
The Days of Wine and Roses,
in 1982. The next year saw the UK (
Rough Trade Records) release of the
album's anthemic lead track, "Tell Me When It's Over," as the
A-side of an EP which also included a live cover of
Neil Young's "Mr. Soul."
Kendra Smith left the band and joined
David
Roback, formerly of the band
Rain
Parade, to form
Opal. She was
replaced in the Dream Syndicate by David Provost.
The Medicine Show, recorded in 1984 in San Francisco with
producer
Sandy Pearlman (
Blue Öyster Cult,
The Clash), was the right step forward for the
band and a genuine rock classic in its own right. But the
commercial failure of the album was the beginning of the end for
the band, and contributed towards its temporary breakup. They
opened tours for
R.E.M. and
U2 and released the 5-song EP
This Is Not The New
Dream Syndicate Album - Live (1984), the last record to
feature Karl Precoda on guitar (who soon after left to pursue a
career in screenwriting) and the first appearance of bassist Mark
Walton. The band left A&M after the label rejected its demo for
"Slide Away" (later released on the semi-official
It's Too Late
To Stop Now).
In 1985, Wynn and Dan Stuart of
Green on
Red wrote 10 songs together which were recorded with Dennis
Duck, among others, and released by A&M as
Danny and Dusty
: The Lost Weekend.
After a brief hiatus, Wynn, Duck and Walton joined with Paul B.
Cutler (of the proto-
Goth 45 Grave) to form the final version of The Dream
Syndicate; they recorded two more studio albums,
Out Of The
Grey (1986), produced by Cutler, and
Ghost Stories
(1988), produced by Elliot Mazer (producer also of several
Neil Young albums, including
Harvest and
Time Fades Away). A live album,
Live at Raji's, was recorded (also by Mazer) before
Ghost Stories but released afterward. There is
disagreement among fans as to which lineup was the best, but in
every permutation the band produced guitar-driven rock music at a
time when
Lou Reed,
David Bowie,
Miles
Davis, and many others were experimenting with
drum machines.
Posthumous releases include
3 1/2; The Lost Tapes
1985-1988, a collection of unreleased studio sessions, and
The Day Before Wine and Roses, a live radio performance
recorded just prior to the release of the band's first album.
Steve Wynn has continued on
as a solo artist. Mark Walton went on to play with the
Continental Drifters.
Albums
DVD
External links
's live music archive
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