Whew! More Gewurztraminer, baby? Here you go. Did the earth move for me too? You bet it did – I didn’t know pinky fingers could bend that way! Wait, you smelled cinnamon rolls too? Oh baby, you’re a dream… What? Mr. Dream? Baby, that’s my father’s name! Heh, heh, I know, that’s a good one. But seriously baby, don’t you know that Mr. Dream is that honest-to-goodness rock band that’s making some of the sharpest tunes around? Their new album, Trash Hit, just dropped, they’ve been singing with LCD Soundsystem, and now they’re spreading the message on tour with Sleigh Bells and CSS. I’m telling you baby, don’t sleep on them! They’re the real thing. Me though, I think I’ll catch a snooze for a minute. Aw come on baby, of course it’s not always gonna be like that. It’s just that good Gewurztraminzzzz…
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GUTFIRE!: Is it accurate to call Mr. Dream (Nick Sylvester, Matt Morello, Adam Moerder) a power trio?
NICK: Yes, but we’d rather not disclose the source of our power.
GUTFIRE!: Other than specific instrumental skills, what are the best things each of you brings to the band? The worst?
ADAM: Matt has a knack for finding the best food options available, no matter where we are. The worst thing I bring to the band is that I don’t know HTML.
MATT: The food thing is actually a double-edged sword, or would be if we weren’t also an aspiring fat band, in which case it’s actually an effective skewer.
GUTFIRE!: Tell us about the new album, Trash Hit.
ADAM: It’s meant to be listened to at the gym. Listen to it anywhere else and it won’t make any sense.
GUTFIRE!: Based on your experience as music critics, write us a trenchant, partially objective review of Trash Hit for our files.
NICK: I’ll let Matt handle this one. He’s our resident writer.
MATT: OK, here goes: “Hang on to your chillwave! Trash Hit, the turbocharged debut platter by Brooklyn music critics Mr. Dream is packed end to end with – you guessed it – music and criticism. While most bands barely listen to music, as a music critic myself, I know that these guys have listened to music, so it can be hard to know how to feel: am I making the music, or are they? Like a Richards-Kravitz supergroup (that’s I.A. and Lenny, class) recorded by Steve Albini if you’ve had a quart of cold Irish whiskey. Nice try.” Rating: 10.0
GUTFIRE!: You’ve mentioned that the album title was informed by the notion of Americans being defined by their waste – where does your brand of aggressive yet melodic rock and roll fit in that cultural landscape?
MATT: If you’ve read Don DeLillo’s Underworld, you might remember that most of the book is about waste and America and kind of dull, but the first part about the Bobby Thomson home run game is really good. I read it in high school, so I think I’m probably forgetting a lot, but ultimately that’s where we’d like to be: intro music for professional ballplayers.
GUTFIRE!: Can you speak to the comparisons of Mr. Dream to band influences such as the Pixies and The Jesus Lizard?
ADAM: Those comparisons are fair. We also steal a lot of ideas from skiffle.
NICK: They’re both great bands whose recordings mean a lot to us. Really I’m thrilled that people hear their influence.
GUTFIRE!: You’re touring with Sleigh Bells and CSS this spring – what are your plans for the rest of 2011? Any collaborations with other bands in the works?
NICK: The three of us performed backup vocals for the final LCD Soundsystem concerts, which was a lot of fun. I also just produced a 7” for this amazing Brooklyn punk band called Sleepies, which came out April 19. They’re like a weirder, grimier Buzzcocks.
ADAM: We’re working on new material, too. So far a lot of it has a goth vibe.
GUTFIRE!: Apart from musicians, you’ve mentioned particular writers (Don DeLillo, William Gaddis) who have influenced your work. What other writers or artists have been great influences?
NICK: Jerzy Kosinski has been a big one lately. He uses simple, almost naive language to describe these absolutely horrific scenes of human cruelty. Bolano has the same trick. I can’t articulate a direct link here to Mr. Dream but it’s an aesthetic that’s been resonating with us, or at least me. We also worship our friend Zach Kanin, who is a cartoonist at the New Yorker.
GUTFIRE!: The band’s name invokes a tattered personification of the American dream – what are your personal American dreams?
MATT: If you combine “American Woman” with “We’re An American Band,” you’re close.
GUTFIRE!: What’s your take on making music in Brooklyn today? Is the sprawling music scene necessarily a boon for rising bands? Can it be a curse?
ADAM: It’s pretty convenient. There are a lot of great venues near our rehearsal space, so transportation is usually cheap. Also, if you need to borrow an effects pedal or microphone or whatever there’s always someone nearby who has it. You can’t throw a rock in this neighborhood without hitting a musician.
NICK: Really the biggest curse for Brooklyn bands right now is the rising cost of hummus.
GUTFIRE!: With the aggressive bent to your music, and songs with titles such as “Knuckle Sandwich,” may we ask – purely hypothetically – whom you might like to fight?
MATT: He knows who he is.
ADAM: I want a shot at former UFC heavyweight champ Brock Lesnar.
NICK: I finally looked him up a few days ago. Brock Lesnar is terrifying. I would definitely want to fight him.
EXTRA CREDIT (Optional)
GUTFIRE!: Could you tell GUTFIRE! the best place in Brooklyn for a guy to get a jerk (chicken)?
MATT: Are you guys in New York and wondering about our opinion, or not from around here and looking for a place to start? The go-to West Indian place near my house closed recently, but I’ve actually had really good jerk chicken at the Jamaican Dutchy cart in Midtown, which is I guess out of bounds for your question. It’s embarrassing, but I’ve never been to any of the places in East Flatbush, though I’ve been meaning to go for years – especially to Boston Jerk City, which besides apparently being awesome presents a lot of good cameraphone opportunities for a Massachusetts native.
GUTFIRE!: Could you tell GUTFIRE! how much a guy might expect to pay to get a jerk (chicken)?
MATT: In dollars or GUTFIRE!?
Check out the video for “Crime,” off Mr. Dream’s Trash Hit album.
And check out Mr. Dream online: mrdreamland.us
Myspace: myspace.com/mrdreamnyc
