Dream Is Over (CD) | Mint (M) Mint (M)

PUP – The Dream Is Over

Label: SideOneDummy Records – SD1615-2

Format: CD, Album

Country: US

Released: May 27, 2016

Genre: Rock

Style: Punk, Pop Punk

1                       If This Tour Doesn't Kill You, I Will

Piano – Graham Wright (2)

2                       DVP

3                       Doubts

4                       Sleep In The Heat

5                       The Coast

6                       Old Wounds

7                       My Life Is Over & I Couldn't Be Happier

8                       Can't Win

9                       Familiar Patterns

10                     Pine Point

Mastered At – Howie Weinberg Mastering

Recorded At – Union Sound Company

Recorded At – Lincoln County Social Club

Recorded At – TA2 Sound & Music

Engineer [Assistant] – Alex Gamble, John Dinsmore, Masumi Kaneko

Mastered By – Howie Weinberg

Performer – Nestor Chumak*, Stefan Babcock, Steve Sladkowski, Zack Mykula

Photography By [Cover Image] – Christopher McKenney

Photography By [Inner Photo] – Jessica Flynn

Producer, Recorded By, Mixed By – David Schiffman

Written-By, Performer – PUP (3)

US CD housed in a digipack.

Barcode: 6 03967 16152 6

 

Surviving too many months in the van and a resultant vocal cord scare for frontman Stefan Babcock, Canadian punks PUP live to tell another tale on their sophomore release, The Dream Is Over. Using the glib prognosis from Babcock's doctor as both their album title and rallying cry, the Toronto-based quartet come off even more ferocious than before on this spirited ten-song effort. With their strong hooks, gang vocals, and spastic transitions, PUP offer a visceral mix of unity and chaos. They've also got a sense of humor that helps keep from getting mired in potential emo/pop-punk tropes, making them sound, at times, like a freaked-out, hardcore Dead Milkmen. Album-opener "If This Tour Doesn't Kill You, I Will" is a fairly self-explanatory airing of band-related grievances with entertaining lines like "everything you do makes me wanna vomit, if this tour doesn't kill you, buddy, I'm on it." It's a sentiment countless hardscrabble rockers likely share toward their bandmates after too way many hours in close-quartered Econoline vans, but it's all just part of the narrative for the PUP brotherhood who, from the sound of it, remain as tight as ever. Their penchant for tasty guitar leads and catchy, fist-raising melodies manifests itself on highlights like "Sleep in the Heat" and "Can't Win." For all their self-deprecation and ramshackle bombast, there's no hiding the band's innate musicality, which reveals itself in the myriad of clever changes and occasional bursts of slick vocal harmony, especially on the epic closer "Pine Point." If the dream really is over for PUP, they sound awfully confident. ~ Timothy Monger

• Media Condition: Mint (M)
• Sleeve Condition: Mint (M)
• Format Detail: CD
• Format: CD
• Genre: ROCK
• Released: 05/27/2016
• Internal ID: JITRE