The Seven Dreams began initially as a study of particular exotic modes by Motzer and Meehan. Later the two had a “chance” improvisation with Slick, who was between tours with Adrian Belew.  A“scheduled” second session provided another layer of thematic improvising with a variety of instruments over the original recording yielding complex colours, world rhythms, melodies, dark textures and orchestrations. While the majority of the album is live in-studio playing, two tracks are reconstructions by Motzer from the original source material. “Unraveling” uses analog synths, and Slicks’ cut-up and mis-aligned percussion taking the listener deep into a dream world. “Elevation,” with Meehans’s Tesla-like looped fuzz bass and  Travis’s electrifying tenor sax solo, travels through turbulence into an ascending backwards piano, resolving into the sounds of a calm river. Travis blasts another terrifying tenor solo on “The Past is Still Present”, and conjures ghostly varispeed flutes on the albums closer ”Persistence of a Memory.”

Goldbug’s avant rock dreamscape is an amazingly satisfying, surprising, and even psychedelic ride through the seven dreams and is best experienced non-stop, from start to finish – a ride that you are not soon to forget.

(Goldbug pictured from top down: Tim Motzer,
Theo Travis, Barry Meehan, Eric Slick)