Feed your head popping poppies, chips of fractured pellucid fog, and scratchy heather to polish the crystal ball that hangs from the inmost concave of your dome. Dream Machine is a husband-and-wife duo, Matthew and Doris Melton, who miraculously arose from the once-still, tepid brew of Matthew's previous group, Warm Soda (which has been reformulated as of 2022). They combine the heavy, proto-metal grooves of bands like Iron Butterfly and Deep Purple with the murky psychedelia of the Doors and the larger-than-life hooks of Heart to create cascades of compelling psychedelic-garage pop.
The Illusion (2017) is Dream Machine’s debut record, released on their good friend John Dwyer’s Castle Face Records, and later reacquired by Matthew's own Fuzz City. According to Matthew, the album is an antidote to the feelings of isolation and dislocation caused by social media and is meant to inspire people to share feelings and music face-to-face again, rather than through an ad-supported data mine. Unplug and unwind with the scaling, Deep Purple-esque guitars and huge, sonorous organs on “I Walk in the Fire,” the folding waves of organs and the relentless bass undertow on “Buried Alive,” the sparking jazz, adrenaline-pumping hooks, and ear-snaring chorus of “All for a Chance,” and the confident, toe-tapping, brick-house blues swagger of “Back to You.”
Ironically, The Illusion is their most concrete and sincerely palatable work, having released two subsequent albums- Breaking the Circle and 2022's Living the Dream- both of which lack the punchy, raw panache of their debut and somehow fail to radiate the same potency of hypnotic magnetism as their initial pledge. Sic transit gloria mundi.
