The beautifully presented, double-album The Morning Lasted All Day, sports photos taken from the band's personal archive as well as from a lost session by the legendary Arthur Elgort and also extensive liner notes by founder Nick Laird-Clowes.
Yap, now at last we get a comprehensive collection containing a thorough retrospective of this seminal band's most impressive body of work.
The wonderful 2-CD, 24-track collection, is chockfull of rarities, some unreleased gems. cover versions (e.g. The Smiths mighty Please, Please, Please Let Me Get What I Want) and even includes a brand new track (Sunrising) recorded especially for this release!
It's a collection with great contributions from the likes of David Gilmour, Johnny Marr, Lindsey Buckingham, Poly Styrene and J.D. Souther.
Hopefully this supreme collection will firmly put the band back on the musical map ... and maybe lead to an era of new Dream Academy music.
With their varied instrumentation, intimate song stylings, and poetic, allusive lyrics,
the Dream Academy always stood apart from their 80s British rock brethren. That they dedicated their hit song,
Life in a Northern Town, to Nick Drake and minimalist composer Steve Reich spoke volumes as to the reach of their intellectual and artistic ambition.
Indeed, though they were together for only three albums and a handful of singles, Nick Laird-Clowes, Kate St. John and Gilbert Gabriel left behind a body of work as captivating as that of any of their contemporaries, their solid songwriting, unusual arrangements and innovative production touches (thanks in part to co-producer David Gilmour of
Pink Floyd) only sounding better with age.
Such a band deserves a proper retrospective; and so we at Real Gone Music enlisted none other than the band's own Nick Laird-Clowes to put together the definitive Dream Academy collection, a 2-CD, 24-track set chockfull of rarities and even including a new track (
Sunrising) recorded for this release!
Alongside such hits as Life in a
Northern Town and
The Love Parade and key album tracks,
The Morning Lasted All Day features such nuggets as the unreleased songs
Living in a War (with David Gilmour on guitar),
The Chosen Few (with Gilmour playing electric and slide guitar) and
The Last Day of the War (a lost track recorded right after
Life in a Northern Town ); the unreleased and much requested instrumental of
Power to Believe from the John Hughes-directed film
Trains, Planes & Automobiles, co-produced by Hugh Padgham; the rare B-side
Girl in a Million, and the long-lost 12-inch side
The Demonstration.
Careful listeners will also hear musical contributions from
The Smiths Johnny Marr,
Fleetwood Mac's Lindsey Buckingham, Polystyrene of
X-Ray Spex and
Eagles songwriter J.D. Souther.
The extensive liner notes by Nick Laird-Clowes offer a look inside the artistic inspiration and recording process for each song as well as the stories behind the band's origins and three albums.
Remastered by Laird-Clowes, and sporting photos taken from the band's personal archive as well as from a lost session by the legendary Arthur Elgort,
The Morning Lasted All Day just may be the best double-album released this year, new or old!
Tracklisting
Disc: 1
1. Life in a Northern Town
2. The Love Parade
3. The Edge of Forever
4. Please, Please,Please Let Me Get What I Want
5. Johnny (New Light)
6. In Places on the Run
7. Ballad in 4/4
8. Girl In a Million (for Edie Sedgwick)
9. Power to Believe
10. This World
11. Here
12. One Dream
Disc: 2
1. Indian Summer
2. Lucy September
3. Hampstead Girl
4. The Demonstration
5. Living in a War
6. Love
7. Waterloo
8. The Chosen Few
9. It'll Never Happen Again
10. Power to Believe-Instrumental
11. The Last Day of the War
12. Sunrising