Stream: The Dream Syndicate, ‘Sure Thing’

Kevin Bronson on November 20th, 2014

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If you didn’t know any better, you’d swear “Sure Thing” was the work of some two-years-away-from-a-razor kids vying for a spot on Burger Records. And if you imagine today’s garage-rock scene as a groovy time warp, it is. Except it’s the Dream Syndicate, circa 1982, just as the Los Angeles quartet was launching a four-album career that would see them become one of the stalwarts of the Paisley Underground scene, which 30 years later finds its DNA running throughout the music of guitar-toting garage-pop bands. This recording, with originals Steve Wynn (guitar vocals), Kendra Smith (bass), Karl Precoda (guitar) and Denis Duck (drums), predates the Dream Syndicate’s breakout debut “The Days of Wine and Roses.” Recorded in the wee hours live at the studios of KPFK-FM, with members of R.E.M., the Bangles and Green on Red hanging out, “Sure Thing” appears on the archival collection “The Day Before Wine and Roses,” which was released in February. Wynn, of course, re-formed the band in 2012, and last December they played with three other Paisley Underground bands – the Three O’Clock, the Bangles and Rain Parade – in a big benefit show at the Fonda Theatre. They are back again, doing a limited tour with a lineup of Wynn, Duck, bassist Mark Walton and guitarist Jason Victor (Wynn’s mate in his post-Dream Syndicate band the Miracle 3). We can’t speak for time travel, but the Dream Syndicate’s songs have always felt like now.

||| Stream: “Sure Thing”