Dreamtime - Critical Reception (November 1986)

 

It is fair to say that the views of the critics writing weekly in the music press were mixed. Here are just two. The first from Sounds Neil Perry is a positive 4/5 star review, but then again of the weeklies it was Sounds and Record Mirror who were always more likely to give the band a hearing. The second review is a slating from The Legend! writing for NME. The Legend! was a pen-name for Everett True or Jeremy Thackery. The NME had a long standing dislike of the band.

The Stranglers

Dreamtime (Epic)

I do sometimes wonder why people feel the urge to buy records like this. Do they find their lives are in some way enriched by the experience? Do they serve the same purpose as little fluffy dice and Winnie The Pooh T-shirts as status symbols? Do they also buy Julian Lennon records?

So what’s to know? ‘Dreamtime’ is the latest in a long, seemingly unstoppable, line of Stranglers albums and sounds precisely the same as the last half-dozen. Electropap. You’ve probably already heard the hit single and know how ridiculous it is; the album is full of earth symbolism, magik and BLAND BLAND music which induces nausea in everyone I’ve played it to. Oh, and one more thing; The Stranglers seem to’ve discovered politics and hence we now get pearls of wisdom along the lines of “The KGB and the CIA, was it you?/Democracy and freedom, was it you?/ I don’t really know what I can see but I can see I’m losing control.”

The two singles, Always The Sun’ and ‘Nice In Nice’ respectively start both sides, I would like to say that they are marginally more bearable than the rest, but they aren’t. DREADFUL!

The Legend!