Back in the late eighties, and early nineties, when shoegaze was still a sort of a novelty, many rock critics predicted that it will be a short-lived fad that will quickly pass.
Some 35 years or so on, not only is that ‘fad’ still around, it seems that it is actually reaching a new peak.
In a way, the same storyline follows A Shoreline Dream, one of the bands that are surely following the same progression lines, and all of it can be heard on Loveblind, the band’s latest offering.
The band’s initial core duo of Ryan Policky and Gabriel Ratliff has been at it for a while now, operating as A Shoreline Dream for more than 18 years or so. Now, the sound revolves around Policky, his vocals and multi-instrumental skills, and guitarist Erik Jeffries.
On Loveblind the band keeps its core sound, the darker side of shoegaze (‘Harlow Syndrome’) but adds touches (or more than just touches) of post-rock, prog, or psych-inclined shoegaze (‘Spiritualized’, for example).
Here, the sound is dense and tight, and as could be expected, the guitar sounds shifts and dominates, turning riffs into melody lines, as most evident on tracks like ‘Driveaway’ and ‘Nothing More Than This’.
Actually, Loveblind gives a bit more than that, some very tight, skilful shoegaze that doesn’t want to go away. And it shouldn’t
