EP Review: Dream State - 'Still Dreaming'
Everyone has a dream. Everyone has that one goal in life they need to achieve to know they’ve made it. That one ambition. Welsh rock group Dream State have already achieved theirs of making splashes in the scene, but it looks like they’re Still Dreaming.
Still Dreaming is the band’s fourth EP, following on from 2023’s Untethered. After getting back on their feet from the shaky foundation of the COVID-19 pandemic, which affected their plans including their support slot on I Prevail’s headline tour, Still Dreaming shows a glimmer of hope and faith that was once lost in the world and is now finding its way back.
In the EP’s title track, it’s strong and it’s confident; just like the message held within its words. ‘Still Dreaming’ is an anthem, not only enforcing self-confidence and bravery and determination, but pushing away all obstacles in the way and breaking down all of the walls in the way of the goal. “Life’s too short to care,” vocalist Jessie Powell sings out and it’s true, it’s honest. Life is too short to listen to those who oppose lifelong dreams and sky-high wants, and Dream State want to remind everyone that nothing is impossible if everyone keeps dreaming.
‘Chin Up Princess’ is a more personally angled track about perseverance and fighting through adversity. With mentions of vices and addictions, Powell sings of the fictional female protagonist, “Wanting to be set free from the ropes of toxicity”. This is a song about breaking vicious cycles and starting a new healthier life for a better and brighter tomorrow.
With a sound still stuck in the band’s metalcore roots, the morals of these song-structured stories hit harder. Using a sound that is heavier, yet still catchy enough to loop around one’s mind for the rest of the day, it relays the messages whether the listener knows it or not. Subliminal affirmation, one may say, and it can work.
One of the smoother tracks on the EP is ‘Set Free’. Beginning softer with a bouncier beat, one that may play throughout the summer as a seasonal soundtrack, it works as a transitional instrumental into the final track, ‘Day Seeker’. This is where smooth sailing becomes choppier waves, but not in a destructive way. More in a fun adventurous way - which Dream State specialise in themselves.
‘Day Seeker’ keeps the same beat and tone of ‘Set Free’, but with Powell’s arena-filling screams and the guitar work of Aled Evans, it becomes a trademark track for the band. There is soul, there is meaning, there is passion: all of these elements come together to make a compound of pure heartfelt metalcore magic.
Dream State are a band that have had their ups and downs in their 10-year-long career, including finding a label to belong to and finding the right line-up to work together in reckless harmony like this four-piece does. But when it all comes together, it shows that dreams really can come true.
Life is about going out and achieving everything one dreams of. Never let go of those goals. Keep on dreaming.
Words by Jo Cosgrove
