071: Trace Mountains - In A Dream

Over the past few years, and under his Trace Mountains moniker, there have been few more capable than Dave Benton at writing short, sharp, and charming indie-pop songs that carry a deep sense of fascination under the surface. On 2020's Lost In The Country - one of my personal favourite records of the past decade - four of the ten songs were under 3-minutes long with a further two songs clocking in under the 2-minute mark.

All of which is to say that new song 'In A Dream', the lead single and opening track from a brand new album, is a glorious and sprawling anomaly; a captivating oddity, all seven-and-a-half minutes of it.

Pulled together with a burgeoning cast of characters that includes Meg Duffy (Hand Habits), Craig Hendrix (Japanese Breakfast), and Josh Marre (Blue Ranger) among other esteemed players, the new album is called Into The Burning Blue and is released on September 27th, via Lame-O Records.

Despite its drawn-out length, 'In A Dream' is quintessential Trace Mountains, a gem of a pop song that shimmers with light but creases with a weight of emotion, carried through the playing, perhaps, or Benton's voice, perhaps, or just an implacable sense of something sung but unspoken.

The drawn out nature of the song suits all of these sentiments perfectly, the whole thing rattling along with a sense of purpose that calls to mind The War on Drugs and other suitably bombastic artists. Here though that bluster feels slightly skewed; a long open road lost in the folds of a map, disappearing off the edges of the page so there's no way of knowing where we might end up.

Listen on GFP / Pre-order via Bandcamp

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