A Twenty First Letter?: An Analytical History of Dream State

I began writing this post in February this year. I had just found out that one of my favourite bands, Dream State, had split up and that I wasn’t going get to see them ever again, or so I thought, and I decided that to show my appreciation for them I should write about them, publish the article, and move on. However, that was not the case. I began the article, and it very quickly went out of hand. Short mentions of songs become long essays, of the cuff references turned into citations, and without my knowing a type of argument, and narrative of sorts, appeared in the history and analysis of Dream State, and I, finally, was able to truly understand why their music was so very powerful to me.

But that was at the beginning of the year though, and now we near its end. Although other things get in the way sometimes, that is a given for life, what got in my way was that I lost the ability to write. I lost the passion. Instead of using my off hours to chase a new dream, I just laid there, a headache in my head, fatigue in my brain, and an ache in my stomach, in a state of nothing. Each opportunity I had to further express myself just built a greater shell around me. Sometimes this article mocked me, made me feel guilty, made me hate myself, made me give up. It's ironic, as you will see, that I was not able to recover. And so nearly a year passed. But I have been getting better, I have been finding ways to avoid those feelings and those moods, and Dream State has still been with me all the way, whispering, or most of the time shouting, into my ear.

I still wanted to finish my article about Dream State throughout all this. I wanted to write something to remember them by as I truly thought that was it, that they were no more. I wanted to write a letter to what they were, an epitaph if you will. But now they have come back and risen again with a fury. Different, yet still Dream State. Suddenly I realised that in order for my words to not be irrelevant, this article needed to be made, it needed to be finished. Dream State, in their own way, again helped me to do it. As they rose again out of the dark, I suppose I have a little as well. We timed our regenerations well it seems.

So, I suppose now is my chance, to begin a recovery, but enough about me.

This article, as I have said, is a type of epitaph to the Dream State of CJ, Aled, Jamies, Danny, Sam and Rhys. It aims to collect aspects of their music and highlight how it helps and assists us, how it functions with lyrics and meaning to create something truly remarkable. If you do not know, Dream State was and still is, I hope at least, a post-hardcore band. A band who expertly moulded aspects across the spectrum of rock and alternative music to create truly original and fantastic songs. Formed in Wales in 2014, Dream State slowly grew into notoriety, but after some years the experience became too much for some of its members to bear, and eventually fell apart until recently when they remolded, metaphorized into the Dream State Jessie, Aled, Jake and Tom. This journey is detailed a bit better later on, however the new Dream State must be a topic for another time.

The core motor of this article is to analyse and break down the meaning of Dream State’s songs, how they work, and what makes them work so well. I will be doing so from a background in literary analysis, as I'm afraid I have very little expertise in music theory, although how the music ties into meaning are of course of great interest here. As analysis is our goal here, biographical information is kept to a minimum, as the art of the music is the core focus. To that end, I use the term 'persona' when referring to the singing vioces of the songs, so as to not conflate biography with art; a trap I think many fall into.

An in-depth analysis of every song Dream State released is beyond the scope of this article, but I am going to pay special credence to some of the band's best and most important song releases, as well as my personal favourites. Let's begin with one of the band's first releases in Consequences, and that's 'Relentless' (2015).

Relentless: The Name and Nature of Psychological Experience

'Relentless' functions as a one-way conversation between the persona of the song, and, I believe, another version of themselves. The song actively denounces wasting time, wasting life, and passivity and it wants to eliminate, perhaps through salvation, being lost to inactivity and falling deeper into the realms of darkness. It can sound like quite a vindictive and angry song, therefore, and it absolutely has that attitude, but that tone of voice is coming from a good place; from the need to save oneself from such darkness and passivity. The song certainly has a mental health subject matter as the lyrics denote an inward communication between two forms of the same person, indeed even the one-way nature of that conversation denotes this. Therefore, the song is also about bearing witness to oneself in one's own worst moments, recognising the terror of such actions, or inactions, and, crucially, offering a chance to escape through an offer of reclamation and a doubling down on the terror of the situation to better aviod it.

The song begins with a very death-core voice screaming the lines:

'You built me up to bring me down

You pulled me in to push me out'

Immediately we get the sense that there is one persona who is angry and irritated with another persona. The lyrics are indicative of a very personable relationship between the two, building someone up emotionally perhaps to abandon them, and involving someone within something to then ostracise them. However, the personable nature of these lines and the intimate nature of them lend themselves more to the idea that this is a single individual doing these things to themselves. They are very intimate violations and are therefore more likely to be inwardly committed than outwardly. Indeed, other lyrics in the song also denote an inward, personable connection between the personas and sets them as the same person, such as in the chorus 'i can't do it again' which implies a shared trauma that both personas have experienced, and 'we're dead' which overtly combines the two together.

Furthermore, running with this idea of there being one person rather than two, the oxymoronic nature of the first lines suggests issues stemming from inward mental illness or instability. The oxymoronic actions of building up and tearing down, pulling in and out is distorted, dysfunctional, jarring, much like what all life, experiences, and actions appear to be or feel like when under stress and emotions of depression and trauma. In addition, having a mental health focus within the song is very much under Dream State's modus operandi.

Although these first two lines are sung with CJ's death-core/metal voice, which may initially suggest that this voice is from an altogether different persona than the rest of the song, it can also denote the closeness between the two. Primarily, these voices are used within metal and rock as catalysts of emotion, as in Flyleaf's Lacy Sturm screaming 'joy will come' to demonstrate and reinforce that idea of hope in the song 'Sorrow' (2006), for example. So, this high emotion that stems from the death-core voice suggests a strong personable link, and what personable link is stronger than your own to yourself? Therefore, a strong, hardcore voice would be what's expected of an individual screaming to not let themselves be taken in by mental illness.

Now with this idea that the persona is effectively talking to themselves, we can see that the following lyrics, now sung not in a death-core voice, are directed at the person's most ill and lost self. It goes:

'You left your sense of control

You dug yourself in that hole'

Quite a lot of blame is thrown at this other persona here, with their experiences being described as their own doing. Although this may seem to be quite cruel and it, can be seen as more self-reflective, an understanding of one's own mistakes, the very thing that can plant the seed in one's recovery. These lines are not being sung in the death-core voice, although stemming from a similar place, I think is down to the intention behind the lines. The first two intend to dissociate with the oxymoronic actions and denounce them, while these lines above have the desire to move on from the actions, and since this relationship continues, it suggests the symbiotic relationship between denouncing unhealthy actions and recognising them at the same time for the sake of growth and recovery.

The song continues and the pre-chorus goes:

'You're a victim to your eyes

But you're relentless

And you're wasting all your light

Fuck I hate it'

Let's take this line by line. So the speaking persona is saying to the 'other' persona that they're a victim to their eyes, implying how they view themselves as the victim.. In addition, they are 'relentless' in this oxymoronic causation of suffering while also presenting themselves as a victim. They have never stopped and will just continue, leaving suffering in their wake. This explains the title of the song somewhat, how it's about the relentless causing of suffering but the refusal to recognize who can cause it, and similarly who can end it, or at least mitigate its effects.

The persona speaking surely desires an end to this suffering and is calling on the other persona to do that. They draw attention to the situation they brought both parties into, a wasting of 'light' which has a double meaning. Simply, the wasting of daylight, where daylight brings opportunity, the ability to accomplish things, begin things, explore things, and so the wasting of ability, and similarly there is the wasting of 'light' in a metaphysical or religious sense, where 'light' carries connotations of grace and blessing, and so the wasting of a blessing, the blessing of life itself.

Echoing the opening of the song with the death-core voice being used to double down on the personal emotions on display, the last line of the pre-chorus channels a similar emotion as the persona screams 'Fuck I hate it'. Both this powerful voice and the explicative serve to emphasize the feelings of opposition to this wasting of life and opportunity and the anger the persona feels to the other persona's destruction under the guise of victimhood.

The chorus then goes:

'(I can't)

And you're going nowhere (I can't)

You're lost inside your head (I can't)

You're going nowhere (I can't)

And I can't do it again

I can't, I can't do it again

I can't, I can't do it again

(I can't, I can't do it again)'

Aside from being an absolute banger, this chorus continues the accusatory tone, mood, and atmosphere even further by combining the 'normal' singing voice and deathcore voice. The accusations of inactivity are substantiated by the powerful deathcore voice repeating with such fiery emotion 'I can't'. This alone expresses how the persona desires to eliminate the inactivity and wastefulness of their other self, which I think is something everyone regardless of specific mental health experiences can empathize with.

In addition, the reference to not 'doing it again' also expresses this need to reduce the inactivity or change the inactive nature of the other persona. It implies that the inactive persona and the singing persona were at one point one and the same, either through shared experienced or through being the same individual, explaining the sheer veracity of how the emotions are expressed in the chorus. Furthermore, it may be said that the deathcore voice in the song is the voice of the other persona but I think this chorus disproves that as both voices are stating the same thing, their opposition to the inactive persona, just one might be more emotionally expressive than the other, not to say that one is not emotionally expressive.

Moving forward the song delves deeper into the inactivity of the other persona and adds to their suffering, self-caused or otherwise, by stating: 'You're so far down, you're in too deep/ The oceans have you now you're lost at sea'. The first line suggests that the inactive persona is falling into something like death, being 'far down' and 'too deep', and what is deeper than six-foot deep? In addition, the line also carries a religious connotation, similar to the wasting of light, like death, and the locality of being 'too deep' brings connotations of hell or eternal punishment in an afterlife. This serves to present the inactivity of the other persona as something horrible, something horrific, something that should be avoided: further distancing the singing persona and the other persona.

The pre-chorus and the chorus then continue the same until we get onto the bridge. Quoted in full here:

'It's in your head

There's nothing just dead ends

Dead ends

There's nothing left, we're dead

(Stop)

Your slipping

Open your eyes cause life is just a dream

And I can't breathe

And I can't leave you behind

Go, no I won't leave

No I won't leave you behind (behind)

So, take my hand

Take control of your life'

The bridge acts as a volta (switch in topic) in the song, it changes the mood and atmosphere from something accusatory to something a little more helpful. It begins, 'It's in your head' which may be taken as a dismissive statement, that 'your sadness is in your head, so it's not real, you're pretending.' But I think this is more of a supportive statement, it's more like 'it's in your head, so your sadness and your inactivity are within your power to solve and change, it's possible for that change to occur, don't let what you can control, control you.' Something that may be quite cruel turns out to be instead helpful, and perhaps that reworking could be applied to the whole song: its apparent accusatory and vindictive mood and atmosphere might not be cruel and may instead be kind. There is a similar idea that is also expressed in the reference to this suffering life as a 'dream', something transient and something that can be avoided.

Then there are references to dead ends which I think also contributes to a more helpful atmosphere. Instead of saying to someone that their life is a dead-end, as in it is pointless, this instead is pointing out their incoming dead ends, the edge of the cliff let's say, where if you go further there's no going back. So why choose to go further, why choose to end up at a dead-end? This idea supports the previous line, that it's within one's own choices and abilities to mitigate their mental anguish, and I do not say that as a final statement, it won't fix everything, someone like the inactive persona isn't going to hear that statement and think 'oh everything fine now I'm cured' but it might be more encouraged to begin a journey of renewal and recovery. it might use that initial fact of self-determinism to begin its journey to a more healthy life.

That idea of recovery is something Dream State's music is all about, it's about the journey of recovery, not trying to find some holy grail of solution of cure but to be with you on your journey, something very aptly put in their song 'Hand in Hand' (2019). And this message from this song is no more clearly stated in the line at the end of the bridge: 'take control of your life'. It is that message that I find so inspiring and beautiful about Dream State, and it's an example of something I like to call Melancholy: the use of sadness within art to create something more beautiful at the end.

Aside from the kind statements here, there is also something else that is very interesting to note. The fact that the singing persona resolutely refuses to 'leave you [the other perosna] behind' states that they truly do hold the wellbeing of that other persona to heart. They care about them, they care about their suffering and they want them to be able to get better. The singing persona does something that we all must do, that in order to see the change you want to see you have actively done it. If you want to see someone get better you cannot abandon them under any circumstances, you cannot leave them alone because if you do then he never wanted to help them in the first place. Therefore the singing persona is effectively the opposite yet compatible version of the other persona, they are active in their refusal to let inactivity thrive.

Now onto the actual music of the song. I always look at lyrics first before musicality even though this is a song and not a poem, as I believe that lyrics are tied to music and if they are not then they certainly corroborate with one another (interestingly even if they oppose each other tonally, such as 'Little Talks' (2011) by Of Monsters and Men).

The song begins with a rift guitar that sounds like you are running into a riot. It expertly builds energy, but specifically anger, and ferocity, relentless energy. These emotions are then further ignited by the core melody of the song that rises note by note and then crashes into a deeper tone. The whole song functions off this chaotic yet engaging rift and melody that continues to rise throughout, using the screams to empower it further with snares from the drums. It builds and builds and builds until the bridge sets in.

The bridge itself quietens a little but still carries the energy, drip-feeding it to the crowd through an underscore to the exasperational tone of the lyrics. We barely get a moment until the rhythm kicks in again and gives just enough time for you to pick your army in the forming wall of death, it builds and builds, bringing all of that chaotic energy to breaking point. You make a stand in a final brief moment of silence before it all comes crashing together, the screams, the rhythm, the melody, as you clash into the other side of metalheads; or just move uncontrollably on the bus to work, as I do.

This bridge is one of the best musical moments by Dream State. The sheer energy of it brings something really powerful to the song and by extension the lyrics.

The latter half continues with its relentless crashing and clashing until it fades out gently, tired, and needing a break. I'm not a fan of fade-out songs but I understand perfectly why 'Relentless' has one, as otherwise, we'd all probably pass out from exhaustion, or feel left alone suddenly by an abrupt end.

'Relentless' is not the first song I listened to by Dream State but it may well have been for all the hardcore Dreamers out there and for anyone who hasn't you're missing out. The death-core vocals aren't Dream State's best, probably owing to this being one of their first releases, but everything else is spot on for hardcore fans. The song, and the whole EP, is primarily focused on exasperations and feelings of anger and frustration at this point, but still, like many of their later songs, has survival and recovery at its core.

In this stage of Dream State's journey the band is just starting out in the wider music world, their EP was self-published and recorded locally, but they began to enter the festival scene, but, as professionals in the business saw. they had a lot of talent and potential and they were signed with UNFD in 2017.

Following Consequences and the partnering with UNFD, Dream State released what is probably their most well-known song, certainly one that launched them into popularity: 'White Lies' in 2018.

White Lies: Navigating Deceit and Confession as the First Step of Recovery

'White Lies' is predominantly about mental health struggles, like many of Dream State's songs. The persona sings about losing her mind and the semantic field of secrecy and lies adds to the pervasive theme of internal struggles and private psychological pain. But specifically concerned with ideas of transgression, social boundaries, and psychological experiences. It is also concerned with the stigma surrounding mental health issues, perceived or actual, and plays with the idea of secrecy and confession in some very interesting ways.

Focusing lyrically, the song begins with an exploration of feelings of transgression, liminal spaces, and stigmatisation concerning the revealing of mental health struggles. The opening verse goes:

'I've got a confession I've got a secret On the tip of my tongue and it's bleeding out You know I've got my reasons This suffocating feeling And the voice in my head is bleeding out'

'I've got a confession' carries religious and social connotations of guilt or previous wrongdoings, and is, therefore, an admission of a transgression of the boundaries society puts in place, in this case, as we shall see, a transgression of social boundaries: a taboo is an apt word. Similarly, 'i've got a secret' also connotes ideas of taboo and social transgression: a secret is kept or made because of a social transgression of what is acceptable, or participation in a taboo.

If we establish that the song is concerned with mental health then we can also state that the social transgressions alluded to are also concerned with mental health. The transgression of mental health is kept as an untold confession or secret to avoid the public knowledge that a transgression has been made: that mental health issues are being experienced. It remains a secret to avoid the negative impacts of being known to be mentally unwell, primarily the stigmatization which is feared to result from the reveal. The persona fears stigmatization coming from her transgression of being mentally unwell and so she 'has a secret' and doesn't let go of it, much like she has an illness.

Moving on the verse also brings up ideas of socially liminal spaces amongst the ideas of taboo and transgression. The secret is 'on the tip of my [the persona's] tongue' and is thus verbally liminal, remaining publically unsaid yet not wholly located within the private mind. Not too different from giving a private, religious confession or wanting to say a secret but being forbidden from it. The secret is also 'bleeding out'. This may literally mean that the secret is close to being revealed, that it is going to exit the liminal space and morph into a transgressive statement: like a public confession or a told secret. Figuratively, the line shows a closeness the persona creates between the ideas of telling the secret and 'bleeding out' which connotes pain, loss, and even death. This suggests that the persona believes that in telling the secret and transgressing they might feel pain, or at the very least discomfort. This idea is repeated in the verse in the line 'there's a voice in my head that's bleeding out' which is still liminal as the voice is verbal, like public speaking, but also simultaneously internal and private in the mind.

But pain at what? Pain from the stigmatisation such a transgression may create. Why else keep such a secret? Well, the persona has their 'reasons'. By concealing the secret they avail themselves of danger from the stigma. However, the persona states they have a 'suffocating feeling': a feeling of imprisonment, confinement, deprivation, within the liminal space of not yet revealing their transgressions. But why is the pain suffocating? There is the oxymoronic aspect of this pain, in keeping the secret the persona hides away from stigma but is victim to isolation in the face of mental health issues, deprived of help, and in telling the secret they become victim to this stigma, or so they believe. Thus the 'white lies' are told.

The song continues into the pre-chorus, which goes:

'And I don't think that I'll ever really change This is not how I'm made'

The persona doesn't believe that 'change' from having these issues is possible, another reason to avoid the revealing of them. The next line however is much more ambiguous. it states 'this is not how I'm made' and the 'this' remains unclear. If it's 'this' as in being unwell then the persona denounces being ill and resolutely states they believe something is wrong, and therefore perhaps believe themselves to be wrong, and the occupier of a space of wrongness as an unwell person. Or the 'this' can refer to the act of revealing being unwell and so the person fears the results of such a revelation and believes themselves to not be made to be stigmatized. In line with this thinking, the line would then connote the persona not being made to receive help from such a reveal, not made to get better, and rather made to reside in the suffocating, liminal, and transgressive prison of telling the white lies. Although the ambiguity is troubling the possibilities of whatever 'this' is cannot be good.

Moving forward, the song's chorus kicks in, beginning with 'Cause I think I've lost half my mind/Fighting my addiction'. 'Losing your mind': a colloquialism of lunacy and madness that is a cruel way of saying being mentally unwell. However, the persona states it's 'half' their mind that they've lost. This implies the transgressive aspect of mental illness, its pervasive and invading movement into the mind, and through the word 'lost' there is an idea that this really is a massive struggle the persona is going through.

The idea of 'addiction' is also referenced. This is an idea that gets attention in other Dream State songs, such as 'Primrose' (2019) however in that song addiction is a result of being unwell, whereas here it's more closely entwined with the illness. The addiction, I believe, is the addiction to keeping these transgressive things secret, and telling white lies, an idea also shared in 'Twenty Letters' (2019). The persona is addicted to being liminal, therefore, in this between space which, although suffocating, is somehow preferrable to being in the open world of the truth.

This addiction results in 'killing, wasting time' like the other persona in 'Relentless', this persona is much like that other persona then, living in dead-ends rather than escaping into a less enclosed space. Then we get one of the most powerful moments in the song, where the persona sings 'i'm not alright', screaming on 'alright'. This is one of the persona's confessions in the clearest terms and the screaming in this line expresses the deep emotional power needed to state it. But this begs the question of if this is a public confession, or just within the persona's mind. Such an answer would be largely irrelevant as the persona confessing even to themselves is something incredibly powerful and massive step in escaping the fear of transgression and stigma.

Moving on, the chorus goes 'and I can do it if I want to' which is a very core line to the song, mainly from its repetition. There's certainly another ambiguity around 'it'. What exactly is this 'it'. It's possible that it's some form of self-destruction, given the references to 'hurt' in the subsequent lines, however, that seems like a very extreme interpretation to me. Perhaps it is instead the admission of being ill and the perceived consequences of that. The running semantic field of lies suggests that the 'it' has to be some form of deceit or truth-telling, and regardless of the actual consequences of that the persona thinks it would cause 'hurt' to both her and the person she sings to: she 'care[s] if I hurt you'. Ultimately then, these feelings of liminality, transgressions, stigma, and deceit are all coming from the desire to not hurt another person. In that sense, suffering for another's better feelings, although somewhat misguided, is to some extent romantic, it comes out of a sense of love or caring. and I think that's beautiful in a melancholy way.

The second verse doubles down on the ideas of the first. The first line goes 'Blinded by these white lies' which adds to the idea of transgression by bringing up the imagery of lines, such as social lines that are not crossed. Interestingly the song repeats this phrase of 'white lines' very close to 'white lies'. This accomplishes the close link between telling these white lies and crossing a boundary, or not crossing a boundary, it aligns transgression with the lie and the withholding of the truth, and indeed what that truth even is. Furthermore, the persona is 'blinded' by these lines, meaning that they are lost or losing their way amongst all these boundaries and lines and that boundaries and taboos make her more lost, more unwell even.

The verse continues and states 'feeling like I'm divine' which is one of my favorite lines. It initially appears to be a strange line as divinity is linked with peace, joy, and pleasure but in connection with the previous line of 'blindness' it instead conjured up the idea of a blind soothsayer. In ancient times, and somewhat even now, soothsays and oracles were seen to be divine, channeling messages of the gods and spirits and in ancient greek myth, some were blind, like Tiresias, which contribute to the idea of the blind wise man. Therefore this line in actually means that the persona is perceived to be mad, unwell, but actually knows a lot more about life, humanity and society, our rules and boundaries, and most inner experiences. This is neither a positive nor a negative thing but does contribute to the idea of stigma, the persona being perceived as a blind mad persona because they are unwell which ignores the inisght into life they actually have.

The next three lines of the verse are, 'And I feel like giving up/ Enough's never enough/ I divorced all my love', which give examples of the harrowing impacts of being mentally unwell, but interestingly there is a paradox. The persona says that 'i divorced all of my love' but she tells lies and deceits for some form of love and so there's a paradox, her illness has even taken her sense or awareness of love away from her. This paradox explains the last lines of the verse, 'Why won't you give up?/ Why won't you give up?'. The persona simply cannot believe why the 'you', who they care for, would not just abandon them as their sense of love had been taken away, they repeat it because it's so alien to them now. Musically, these lines have added weight to them thanks the screaming, the voice brilliantly expressesing the harrowing feelings of these experiences but also the feelings of exasperation and exhaustion.

At the bridge of the song, we have the confession of transgression and secrecy in absolute terms. the persona finally says: 'I need help/ I've gotten myself lost again/ I can't do it on my own' and pleads with the other person to stay with them. This confession is initially told with the undercurrent of the most relaxing music of the song, the music is airy with long falling high notes like a moment of bliss nearly, or clarity rather, where the persona enters a new space where the confession has been made. But then after this comes the buildup of the song again back into the crash of the chorus. The beat of the drums increases and quickens like the heartbeat of the confessor, the fear that comes with confession, and the admission of secrecty. the music in this instance expertly represents the feelings of the moment. No matter if this confession is internal or public it is still a powerfully evocative moment for the persona and certainly a huge step forward.

The song comes to its close with the persona's somewhat retrospective take on their experiences of secrecy and lies, they repeat 'my white lines' and 'my white lies'. Firstly, they take on responsibility for their acts of secrecy but moreover, they acknowledge that such secrecy and fear of transgression was within their power to alter. the boundaries that kept them within secrecy were actually theirs to change and move, the boundaries, the 'white lines' were as much theirs as the 'white lies'. Although 'White Lies' is not one of Dream State's songs of recovery, it is about acceptance and the journey that would eventually become recovery. The act of asking for help, being honest, of releasing your own agency and power are all precursors to recovery, and although the song may appear to be more of a negative experience on first listen it certainly has more uplifting and positive moments than one might initially expect.

Musically, 'White Lies' is the beginning of Dream State's excellent musical style, with very heavy and hardcore vocals and rhythms for the hard-hitting moments and verses, math rock and metal style melodies for the choruses, and an addition of post-hardcore sensibilities and emotions in the bridges. Dream State would go on to hone and perfect this style even further and develop it but they retained the basics of good old metal and hardcore vocals and catchy, heavy melody and rhythm. 'White Lies' is perfect to pit to, and I can speak from experience there.

'White Lies' catapulted Dream State into popularity. But after the release guitarist, Sam Harrison-Little, left the band the same year. However the band continued down the path of popularity and later released another EP entitled rather fittingly 'Recovery' in 2018 which featured many songs that deserve more consideration, such as 'New Waves' and 'Solace' but I think the best ones to consider, and also my favorites from this EP, are 'In this Hell' and 'Help Myself'.

'In This Hell' and In This Choas: Anxiety and its Effects

'In This Hell' (2018) is one of my most loved Dream State songs as it's one of the heaviest and perfected the brilliant interplay between hardcore vocals and post-hardcore melody and rifts. In terms of analysis, everything in the song contributes to a sense of chaos and the experiences of anxiety that are chaotic or hellish, like discpomfort, pain, lack of control, and being lost, but it still involves themes of recovery and resislaince,

The song begins in a similar way to 'Relentless', with a build-up in volume and intensity but in this case works in tandem with the vocals that similarly rise in volume, reaching the apex with screaming: kickstarting the core melody of the song. This creates a very powerful intro and is sure to get the blood pumping.

What this intro music does for the first lyrics, which are also the lyrics of the chorus, is add to the idea of chaos and confusion by its own chaotic nature; the repetition of questions and pleading with someone in 'Is it all for nothing?/ Is it 'cause my head's not clear?/ Tell me you feel something/ Tell me is my heart still there' become even more chaotic. In this way, 'chaos' in the song becomes a synonym for 'hell' both being places which bring pain, discomfort, and destroys any chance of calmness.

The chaotic nature of the song is further developed by the music and lyrics of the first verse. The music becomes very airy and calm before crashing into a heavy rift to spark the lyrics. This contributes to the chaotic nature of the song through suddenness as it is unexpected and destroys any chance of continual repose and relaxation.

Lyrically the first verse also carries this idea of chaos but goes into more detail. It goes, 'Twisting my tongue, laid on the floor' which suggests discomfort in verbal situations and discomfort in a more literal sense, the floor being less comfortable than, well, anywhere else perhaps. The verse goes on, stating 'I'm choking on air' which again adds to the idea of chaotic discomfort, but adds to it by stating that the very act of existence, breathing, is uncomfortable and almost dangerous with the illusion of choking and losing breath. Furthermore, the line ' I've misplaced all my thoughts' takes the experience of the persona's life beyond discomfort or even danger and makes it unknowable and uncontrollable, much like chaos. It cannot be understood and creates the loss of things, even of the mind.

The rest of the chorus I find very interesting, it goes:

'I feel like I've drowned

And I've wound up on your shore

And I feel so exposed You can see my core'

The allusion to a shipwreck suggests that the persona's life has been destroyed in some way by the chaos of a storm and the hellish nature of their life. Interestingly there is a reference to a 'you', another person, like in many of Dream State's songs, which implies that the persona has maybe been saved by, or at least ended up at the mercy of, another, like a friend or a loved one, who, because of the chaos, sees the 'core' of the persona. In all this chaotic destruction this other persona can see the very nature of the singing persona. the chaos has stripped them of protection, agency, comfort, and calmness but in the process has allowed the innermost part of the singing persona to be known, confessed to another with all the weight such an action brings, as discussed in 'White Lies'.

The pre-chorus, 'am I just losing myself, in this hell?', again brings about the idea of chaos, 'hell' as an apt description of chaos and destruction, but how the line takes the form of a question implies that the persona hasn't been lost yet 'in this hell'. This is significant as it implies the chance of recovery, out of chaos comes destruction but as we have seen in the previous verse also honesty; being stripped bare and becoming something more truthful in the process. Although this line may make it seem like the persona is lost, there is a deliberate ambiguity in it which gives the possibility of something not so horrible.

The musical aspect of this pre-chorus brings another build-up that adds energy to the line, in essence adding some agency to it making its meaning something not altogether negative and allowing room for positivity, as the lyrics themselves also do. The tone of how these lyrics are sung is neither angry nor relaxed, neither knowledgable nor confused, and so is itself chaotic and forces the listener to experience the chaos by presenting them with something ambiguous, which is again also done through the lyrics themselves.

The second chorus repeats the opening lines but with heavier music that fluctuates in pitch beneath it which, aside from sounding amazing, may symbolize a wave, like one in a tempest that wrecks a ship, evoking the previous verse. There is an addition to this verse however in the line 'i cannot sleep at night from all this anxiety/ No, I cannot sleep at night'. Here we get the reason for all this chaos and hellish experience, anxiety. All the experiences of chaos explored previously are a result of anxiety and they are certainly very apt, exploring discomfort, panic, and restlessness. The song is then, in essence, a treatise to the experience of anxiety.

Following on, the second verse is split into two halves, both of which explore chaos and hell as a theme of anxiety but in different ways. Musically, the first half functions as the first chorus, but lyrically it's very different. There are ideas of cold brought up in the lines 'And I feel frozen/ I feel ice cold'. this is very interesting given that the rest of the song is concerned with hell and chaos which opposes these images of coldness and stagnancy. However, with those ideas in mind, these references still express feelings of chaos and hell. In terms of chaos as a theme of anxiety, nothing is fixed and nothing is controllable, it's all random, and so anything can happen, or it can feel like anything can happen and with that brings fear, being petrified into ice, or just becoming something unexpected. In terms of hell as a theme of anxiety, it is true that in Dante's Inferno at the centre of Hell lies Satan in Ice, 'The Emperor of the kingdom dolorous/ From his mid-breast forth issued from the ice' (Inferno XXXIV), which thus implies that the persona is in the deepest parts of hell.

Finally, in this verse, there is another reference to being stripped away and laid bare as the persona is 'wide open' and there is a brilliantly gothic image of 'i keep picking up my bones' which states that the singer sees their life as one destroyed as a result of chaos and with the idea of death this image brings, also pushes the singer further into the kingdom of death in hell,

The second half of this verse functions differently, however. Lyrically it goes:

'Have I gone insane? Am I still the same? Twisted heart and messed up brains Someone pull the chain, pull me out of this grave Flush the toxins, keep me awake'

There's repeating imagery and aspects of chaos including questions and references to graves which contribute to the hellish experiences the singer has and depicts anxiety as 'toxins', similarly chaotic in therm of lacking comfort and creating pain.

Musically however it's very different. here is what I believe to be the best part of the song. the persona screams on the word 'bones' which kickstarts the rest of the verse and makes it very heavier and more like metal music; as previously stated screaming adds emotions and so this screaming catapults the meaning of the lyrics by adding distinct emotion to them and works as a treatise of the experiences of anxiety: emotionally powerful, chaotic and in some way scary and relentless.

Moving onto the bridge, the rhythm dies down and becomes airy again creating a calm, almost retrospective, section of lyrics. The singer states that 'Cause I'm breathless' which echoes the previous line 'choking on air' and thus explores similar ideas however this line suggests something more than that because breathlessness is the end of choking, the end of the hellish, chaotic situation which we know all means the end, or result of, sadness and anxiety. This exploration of the results of anxiety is further demonstrated in the next two lines: 'I'm beyond repair/ I'm hopeless' by their propagation of fear and worry, two core pillars of anxiety. The singer has let anxiety get the better of her, and they cannot see a way out, all further echoed by the lines 'It's all endless/ Battle of affairs/ It's always in my head.

This exploration of anxiety's impacts is underscored by the calm music which seems somewhat paradoxical. At the time of most anxiety, the music is at its most calm. Although this doesn't last and the next set of lines are screamed in Dream State's iconic manner. It's interesting why this section is so calm. Perhaps it is expresses letting go, giving up almost. Which is a sad thought. However, I wouldn't be so quick to assume this section is all about defeat. The fact that the next section is so explosive with screaming and noise it suggests that these ideas of anxiety and defeat and self-doubt don't last and that they can be overcome by some other emotion. And just that idea, represented in the changing of the music, is at least a lot more uplifting than letting the anxiety take over completely; although anger takes its place, anger can lead to many great things whereas anxiety cannot.

Exploring the next section lyrically, however, anxiety still wins. The section goes: 'All of the responsibility clouded in negativity/ It's so bleak/ I've lost the feel/ I don't know what is real'. Unfortunately, not everything has a silver lining and not everything can be about recovery, and the end of the song certainly doesn't offer a more positive end to these ideas of chaos, anxiety, and hell.

Although the fact that 'In This Hell' isn't entirely about recovery doesn't detract from Dream State's other more uplifting songs. If you think about it, in order for those other songs to be uplifting, they need to be uplifted from something. 'In This Hell' provides the lowest of low feelings, it provides the things to be recovered from, and because of that, it gets an important place in Dream State's oeuvre of music. Their songs simply would not function the same without it. Regardless of its hellish nature of it, it has an important place and because of that 'In this Hell' is certainly one of the band's most important songs.

Other songs on this EP include the fantastic yet underrated 'Help Myself' (2018) which has a wonderfully metal/pop-punk feel, and the song that carries the most weight in terms of recovery, 'New Waves' (2018), which although isn't my favorite certainly gives the EP its deserved title.

At this point in Dream State's journey, they keep on gaining ground. Exploding in popularity, and gaining a significant fan base, what they called 'Dreamers'. In the same year as Recovery, the band won an award from Kerrang Radio for Best British Breakthrough, gaining them critical success. The band retained its members throughout the year and went on to create songs that would later enter their debut album Primrose Path in 2019. The most important of which I believe to be 'Hand in Hand' and 'Primrose'.

'Hand In Hand': Recovery and Companionship

'Hand in Hand' is one of Dream State's most special and personable songs, as it delves deep into themes of companionship, emotional turmoil, and the journey towards recovery. It's not their heaviest but it's one of their most uplifting songs, for sure.

The song begins: 'Sweetheart are you done/ on the other side?/ Hand in hand we fall/ Fighting for our lives'. Immediately starting with a term of endearment, 'sweetheart', immediately presents love, affection, and care as the core tenants of the song's themes, which allows for a deeper more uplifting interpretation of the song's later ruminations of death, suffering, and loss.

Speaking of which, at the end of this first line, the blunt sounding 'done' suggests an ending of something, but perhaps the death of something is more appropriate given the subsequent allusion towards the afterlife, 'on the other side'. The question becomes, then, the death of what? I think, from the colloquial use of the phrase 'are you done' which is usually used when someone pauses or stops doing something annoying or stops complaining about something. It's the end, death let's say, of something probably negative.

This opening line alone states that for the singing persona her loved and cared for 'sweetheart' has just ended a negative experience, and that version of them that exists within that experience has died, which gives room for their re-birth almost or afterlife post-death. Even in the song's darkest words, it's still holding onto a sense of positivity, of better futures post horrible pasts.

Moving on, the lyric 'hand in hand we fall' further reinforces the idea of affection and care through the imagery of connection and companionship. And as this is also the title of the song it makes this idea of affection and companionship pertinent to the song as a whole, similar to the first word.

Furthermore, 'we fall' also suggests companionship but also implies another change or movement to the death alluded to at the start. Therefore, this Dante like journey of the persona's loved one is accompanied by the persona themselves, hand in hand. This big focus on companionship, affection, and shared journeys gives the song its uplifting nature and sets up the rest of the song's narrative as something, although referred to through melodramatic imagery of death and hell and monsters, as simple as one person's journey beyond something horrific and their companion, the singing persona, helping them along the way.

With that context in mind, we can assess the Dante and Virgil like journey into the afterlife that the two personas go through. We get some backstory into the singing persona's life, they are 'black and blue' which obviously suggests pain and trauma which for them 'started so young'. The persona may well have experienced the same painful past as the journeying persona, making them a fitting guide for the journey that now must be made.

This section is concerned with the past of the singer but they also express their present emotions and actions. They state: 'I keep running into hell/ Running into hell/Looking for God'. These lines I believe are the best lines of the whole song. They're ambiguous and challenging and the imagery is loaded with meaning and melancholy. Either the persona is mistakingly or purposefully running into hell looking for god. In either instance, why would they believe God to be in hell? Well, as per the best atheist argument, the mistake here is based on the logical assumption that if God existed and created life and all that happens in it, then they must surely be amoral to the extent of being evil; a creator of suffering and pain not a rectfier of it, seems more evil than Satan. Therefore, thinking this, the persona is not wrong when they believe God to exist in Hell.

With regard to the above, these personal actions and experiences of the singing persona would mean that firstly they are well informed to be a guide, as someone with similar experiences to the journey and experience of going through a similar journey in the 'afterlife'. Secondly, it adds further to the companionship and affection that the two personas have, further strengthening their relationship. This is important as it demonstrates the possibility of an effective, powerful and positive experience post-pain through human relationships. It offers a perspective that is not all about more pain and terror but is instead about affection and that presentation is so powerful in and of itself, it gives hope to those journeying beyond pain.

The remainder of the song has some interesting and powerful lyrical and musical choices. The first is repetition. The two lines 'In your heart you wanna run/In your head you wanna hide' repeat throughout the song, mainly after the choruses. These lines come from a of position of understanding, they know the feelings and emotions that the traveling persona will and does experience, that of reluctance and fear of moving forward. Interrestingly, the references to heart and mind makes these experiences very personal and internal, thereby making the singing persona all the more trustworthy of a guide and a companion as they know internal aspects of the traveller. The repetition of these lines further reinforces the trustworthiness of the singing persona in this way.

Another repeated line is 'We all wanna be, just wanna feel loved'. Which, while being a heartbreaking expression of desiring basic comforts in life, functions to highlight the target or goal of this whole endeavor. The movement towards the 'light', the end of hell and death and into the afterlife, why the journey is being made in the first place.

Moving onto the bridge, repetition continues with the lines 'I just wanna make it all stop/ I'm gonna give it all that I've got' which culminates with the same lines being screamed, kickstarting the final chorus. Other than continuing the presentation of the journey's purpose, these lines, through the screaming of them at the end, further reinforce the sheer power and resistance needed to conduct such a journey of this manner. The screaming forms a shield for the travelers, it ignites what is needed within them to finish their journey post-death into something nearer life.

Beyond repetition, there is a further interesting musical choice in the song. Just before the second chorus, a verse is shared between a male and female persona. Since the rest of the song has the female voice we can is assume that this other male persona is the one making the journey for the first time, the one being guided. With that in mind, the male persona's words are telling of the difficulty of such a journey. They state, 'I'm not my best, comforted by mess/ Somewhere in the blank space of my mind/A labyrinth with no light.' The persona speaks of being lost in a 'labyrth with no light' and has a 'blank space' in their mind, both of which are similarities to ideas of death through their liminality and emptiness. We can see this persona is lost within the emptiness they are feeling then, their 'death' after their pain is almost too much to bare.

In response to this persona's pain, however, the female, guiding persona offers some crucial words of insight. They say 'And all the mountains they can't be moved/Push the envelope, work the grooves/Strength comes from adversity/It all starts with you and me'. This first line about mountains in the first instance relates to something immovable and the futility of attempting to move it, and instead the better choice of learning to live with the immovable thing, to survive it, for want of a better word. Further to this imagery, however, is the clear illusion of the phrase 'If the mountain will not come to Mohammed, Mohammed will go to the mountain' which invokes similar ideas around adapting and adjusting to situations, as well as changing and evolving depending on need, necessity, and experience which obviously has huge implications for the narrative in the song. The combining of religious allusions here speaks to a universal spiritualityof the journey and experiences explored within the song itself.

The second line in this verse, 'push the envelope, work the grooves' invokes very active imagery and the colloquial metaphors of bribery and perfecting only further reinforce the ideas of the first line, that of adaption for neccessity, but it adds to that idea by using active imagery. It suggests that the power of adaption and change in the face of opposition is within us.

The last two lines of this verse are really powerful: 'strength comes from adversity/It all starts with you and me'. The persona could not be more clear in this statement. It's the difficulty of the journey itself which gives the resolve to complete it. Further to this the persona also gives the traveler power, 'it all starts with you and me', as in recovery starts with the journey itself and the journey occurs because of the travelers resolve. In essessence then, recovery is at the behest of the journeyer, the pained, the anguished. Thier power is nevermatched by the difficulty of the journey itself, the journey can never be too daunting for them. This is a very powerful statement as it places power in the hands of those who belive themselves to be powerless.

The final section of the song culminates all of the above feelings, epitomized by the last line: 'I know you gotta get better'. This not only places the goal of this overall journey in sight, it also demonstrates that others, whom are not the pained journeyers, understand the difficulty of such a journey, whatever it may be. it makes them seen, heard and even touched. The knowledge of their pain and the desire to travel with them is the hand in their hand.

Muscially, 'Hand in Hand' uses meter to express its meanings, more so than other Dream State songs. Throughout, each line has a consistent metere of stressed (/) to unstressed (U) syllables, for example

'Sweetheart are you done,

/ U / U /

on the other side?'

/ U / U /

Hand in hand we fall

/ U / U /

Fighting for our lives'

/ U / U /

This grouping of syllables represents a coupling, and by extension we can say the coupling of the two personas together on the painful journey, but it also acts as a reflection. Each line reflects the next, onto the next, onto the next and so on, portraying a journey. The meter adds to the motifs of both togetherness and journeys throughout the song.

Furthermore, in this above opening lines each lyric has a consistent count of 5 syllables, 'sweet-heart-are-you-done'. again this portrays a sense of togetherness and oneship, the lines are different yet share a commonality, much like the two personas and indeed anyone helping another person out of empathy.

Interrestingly, this 5 syllable count is not consistent throughout the rest of the song, most lines are between 5 and 8 syllables. However, the stressed syllable metere remains consistent keeping that sense of togetherness throughout the song. Thus, I would say that this fading of this apparent coupeling with the consisatnt coupling beneath it is allegorical of personal relationships at time of pain. When one is in pain or is hurting emotionally. they tend to feel more alone and more helpless and thus the things within their lives that may offer joy, like companionship, begin to fade away, however that does not eliminate the exisistance of such companions. They're still there even if we don't always allow them in, and I belive this structural design of 'Hand in Hand' expresses that.

On the same note, the musical notes of the first few lines also suggest this same togetherness, with single rifts of music that may appear alone at the beginning all come together in the riving mass of the math-rock rhythm. It's initial sense of loneliness becomes its most powerful force of togetherness.

Finally on 'Hand in Hand', the relationship between the journeying persona and the singing persona, as a core aspect of the song's narrative, has further metatextual meaning. It can be read as not just a fictional relationship but a relationship that is somewhat representative of the relationship between Dream State's listeners and Dream State themselves, where the music's importance to the listners, if they are journeying themselves, is as important as the lines of love the singer gives to the journeryer in the song. The singer is the band and the journeyer is all of us. While presenting two companions hand in hand the band also extends a hand to their audience.

This metatextual relationship is very pertiant for Dream State as musicians at this time, as their fanbase grew and become more special to them as a band. They had cemented thier community of 'Dreamers' and had built a relationship with them, and having a song that involves the relationship of companionship, help and support like 'Hand in Hand' is really apt for the bands fans, who like myself, I would imagine, gain a lot of comfort and joy from Dream State being in our lives, and we hope vice versa for Dream State themselves. No matter if this was metatextual relationship was intentional, the presence of it within the song adds to its enjoyability and certainly cements it as one of Dream State's most special.

Primrose: Rejection, Dejection, Addicition

'Primrose' is one of Dream State’s most popular songs and occupies an important part of the overall album, Primrose Path. The song is yet another example of Dream State’s excellent and original representation of mental health issues and, as I will argue, their persistent encouragement and overall ideas of recovery. Also, the song has a great almost metatextual use of music that not only directly intersects with themes of mental health but also themes of social rejection and dejection and where we, as Dream State fans, Dreamers, can get more involved with the issues the band is so focused on.

The song begins with a colloquial tone, which is a prominent feature of the entire Primrose Path album in general. That colloquialism functions as a focal point that grounds us in the reality of the singing persona's life: ‘I can't come in today, I think I've caught a bug/ I know I need the pay, right now don't give a fuck/ Because today I'm just so tired of myself/ I just want to dwell’. We get an insight into their life and their emotions and the issues that are plaguing them: money, energy, health, job, and things that plague the rest of us: universal anxieties. That closeness and reality make the wounds of the persona, their fatigue and apathy, felt all the more deeply by the listeners.

It is clear that this persona, like many of the other Dream State personas, is suffering and the song works in a confessionalism style to express that suffering. However, unlike many of those other songs, Primrose doesn’t have an overt message of recovery within it. But, as CJ has herself stated, that apparent lack is in fact a gain. Simply put, the expression of these issues and the bringing of them to the light disintegrates the stigmas and taboos surrounding them. This persona's honesty breaks the silences that keep many others trapped. Their acknowledgment of ‘i’m not alright’ speaks volumes for those who cannot say such things themselves yet.

With regard to those sufferings in the song, we can see that this particular persona is dealing with issues of depression, isolation, and apathy, but interestingly these are expressed through motifs of addiction.

Firstly, references to addictive practices are referenced multiple times in the song. There's the lyrics: ‘I've been drinking and maybe it's not such a good thing’, ‘'Cause I'm drunk and on my knees’, and ‘I'm smoking too much, I'm staying in bed’.

The references to alcohol and smoking clearly suggest they are used as coping mechanisms, but they are also seen to be detrimental to the persona, they’re not a ‘good thing’ and she smokes ‘too much’. Yet she still comes back to them, they’re so addictive that the damage they cause is negligible to the persona.

With that theme concretely placed within the song, it can be applied to the other most common reference, to sleep and beds. Similar to alcohol and smoking, sleep is a coping mechanism that is destructive, it encourages apathy and stagnation; we know from the opening line that it causes the persona to not go to work, lose money, and dwell in bed. They plead ‘i wish I had another way’ which suggests that they know how all the avenues of escaping or coping with their illness are damaging, yet there is nothing else available for them.

Both this and the other addictive actions are indeed a common response to mental health issues, as well as issues of stress and anxiety. But furthermore, these references don’t just instill the idea of a losing battle with mental illness, they imply that the mental illness is something they cannot get away from, something they can't kick like one might kick drink and drugs. The illness is itself addictive, but specifically as addictive as drinks and drugs are, damagingly addictive.

The persona repeats in the bridge of the song: ‘why do I keep falling back on myself’ and also the lines ‘and I can’t, I can’t let it go’. To an extent, the persona is addicted to these harmful feelings, or their mental illness is causing them to be addicted to them and not be able to let them go: to abandon them. The song presents such emotions as addictions, things that pervade an entire life, and will now allow freedom from it; the persona desires this freedom by saying ‘will you just leave me alone?’ but is denied it, saying: ‘i can feel my restraints now’.

By the way, another amazing song that uses very similar themes and topics as 'Primrose', particularly addiction, is ‘Injection’ by Rise Against, do yourself a favour and check it out.

Another consistent theme shared across almost all Dream State's songs is the references to God and theology, and here is no different. The persona pleads to God multiple times throughout: ‘God just give me some release/ God just give me something please’. These two lines link in with the other motifs within the song, the ‘release’ asked for could link to the feelings of restraint and isolation the persona is experiencing and the ‘something’ can apply to the feelings of addiction, as in the persona is pleading for another thing to occupy her life which is not so harmful.

The importance of asking God here is better understood in the other theological reference to demons in the song: ‘I've let those demons back in my head’. The fact that the persona is pleading with God to help them, and without that help she has let demons into her life, it implies that God has forsaken them, or has forgotten them. Like 'Hand in Hand', God is not as perfect as they might be perceived to be,, they make mistakes, they fail, and they have failed this person.

However, I don’t think this theological showdown is trying to promote an interpretation of God, more so it is using the archetypes of God and demons to express the persona's mental illness and their struggles: the God as salvation and better health, the demons as damnation and illness.

Furthermore, the idea of an all-powerful deity that could do more to help but isn't, I think, is applicable to the mental health context in other ways. Mainly the narrative of an all-powerful force that can help and even save someone struggling with mental health but chooses not to or fails to is a story we’ve heard far too many times before in the real world. Stories of vulnerable people, like the persona who is ‘naked’, completely vulnerable stood before the all-powerful one, but being left without help or hope, eventually being lost. This powerful force may be society or, I think more accurately, the governments and healthcare systems that can improve lives but let people through the cracks and lose them. This song is simply another example of that.

Before we finish on ‘Primrose’, I'd like to give some detailed analysis of the most interesting sections, and of course the music.

There is a line in the chorus that goes: ‘I’m not good, I’m naked, misunderstood, I know’. Initially, this line threw me off and I didn’t know what to make of it, but now I think it’s a weightier expression of being dejected and forgotten by the God/Society/Government in the song. Simply, the persona is ‘misunderstood’ as in unknown, alien, and from that, they are treated with rejection. Moreover, ‘misunderstood’ may also refer to something more like ‘mis/undiagnosed’ or ‘mis/untreated’. Not only is the persona forgotten and left to the addictions and illness that will ruin their life, the powers that be don’t actually know how to help them, or at least that’s what the persona thinks, they ‘know’ they are ‘misunderstood’. Either this is a protest against being misunderstood, and in essence a protest against the inadequate systems in place, or it’s a warped view of the self where the persona views herself as broken and untreatable, which itself is another example of the horrible impact of mental health problems.

Another significant section worthy of attention, is the ‘screaming verse’, a verse where a death/hardcore voice is used, which appears in almost every Dream State song. The verse goes, in full:

‘No, I broke from my God

I covered myself in dirt

I can't get stuff done, I'm feeling the dread

I'm smoking too much, I'm staying in bed

I've let those demons back in my head

I need to find a balance 'fore I lose myself again’

First and foremost, we get another reference to God which can be read in two ways. Either the persona broke with God and in doing say has taken their own life into their hands, or they have broken with God because of their actions and is now left alone with no help. The first interpretation I think would add a significant number of uplifting ideas to the song and get it more aligned with the idea of recovery, the idea of an ill person rejecting the supposed grace of God to tackle things by themselves is a truly inspiring image. However, the later lines of being buried in dirt, death almost (maybe even suicide as they covered themselves in dirt), letting demons back in their head, smoking too much, and losing themselves, suggest that if they have rejected God/Society/Government/Healthcare and that they now can’t beat their illness. They begin to fight a losing battle. That is why the second interpretation, which brings up ideas of self-dejection seems more apt, the persona is addicted to self-destructive actions after all, and what's more self-destructive than rejecting an all-powerful beneficiary, not just God but maybe doctors or friends?

Where does this leave the idea of recovery in the song then? Does it just paint a bleak image of dejection and self-destruction? Well as I stated at the beginning of this section, recovery, in the way Dream State wishes to express it, is not just stating feeling better, having better health practices, or getting help. It starts with being able to admit the problem. It is the movement above stigma and feelings of shame and isolation and taking the first step on the road to recovery. Singing about these issues de-stigmatises them and makes that first step so much easier. So, although this song isn't all sunshine and happiness, that does not mean it is not about recovery, or that it isn't helpful.

Musically, the song is of course as fantastic as Dream State has always been. In particular, the above section has great use of hardcore vocals and interestingly uses both hardcore vocals and 'normal' signing voice to express the precipice the persona is currently on. They are in a battle and they might be losing, as they let the demons back in their head their voice becomes darker and more menacing yet theiractual human voice is still there, still salvageable.

Other than that, the song plays about with so many genres, such as hardcore, post-hardcore, prog rock, punk, and math rock, as well as slight instances of electronic music with warped and almost glitchy sounding riffs and vocals. Most interesting and effective is the use of backing vocals and a high-pitched voice at the end of the song speaking monosyllabic words that are very difficult to make out. All of these various things function to make the song an almost warped and twisted reality, not quite one thing and not quite another, not quite real and coherent. This would obviously feed into the feelings of mental illness in the song expresses but I think more than that it makes the song 'misunderstood'. I use that word as it was used in the song, as a by-word for un-diagnoseable, untreatable. The music of the song becomes like the persona, something not fully understood by the powers that be. In this case, it's the powers of music genres that like to categorise music into boxes that misunderstand and somewhat mistreat the song, looking at you Spotify (who categorizes Dream State as ‘pixie’, which seems like a guess at categorising the band).

However, the difference here is that this misunderstood music has something to understand and appreciate it, to help it, and treat it as it should be treated, who love it. That is us, the fans. Maybe, we as Dream State listeners can occupy the space of the all-powerful in these songs, and if we can do that maybe, just maybe, we can be the ones that look after others and we can save people where other systems have failed to; maybe that’s what these songs are ultimately encouraging us to do.

And that is why I think this song is a perfect example of Dream State's mastery, and why it forms such a central part of their overall album. The whole album deserves a more in-depth analysis of each song which maybe I might endeavor to do, however, I will say that it is a brilliant debut full-length album that not only shows Dream State’s particular style but serves as a platform for them to experiment musically and develop as a band. They take every opportunity to expand on their skills and this album is a perfect example of that.

Monsters: Memory, Past, and Recovery?

And now we enter the last Dream State release before the new line up, their October 2021 release: ‘Monsters’. Perhaps the most uplifting Dream State song, which brings issues of irony.

The song begins with an acknowledgment of the persona's previous struggles. It goes: ‘I'm just a little bit of a mess/ I wear it all like a pretty dress/ Kind of exposed but honest/ I'm learnin' to love all of me.’ The persona knows that they struggle and have struggled, however they refer to these struggles, and even the discussing of them in the song, as wearing ‘it all like a pretty dress’. This states that the persona adorns her struggles and presents them to others, almost like a performance, and this may initially appear vain perhaps, but the following line of ‘kind of exposed but honest’ implies that the persona wilfully wears her struggles outwardly to be honest above all else.

As a woman may gather the jeering and harassing eyes of men by wearing a dress, something beautiful, or exposing we could say, this persona wears her struggles and may receive the same jeering and harassing looks, but that is worth it for the honesty of the expression. In these first lines we see the clear difference between this persona and other Dream State personas, this one wants to present her struggles and be honest about them. The honesty allows for greater understanding, which is clearly shown in the line ‘i’m learnin’ to love all of me’, as in I'm learning from my own honesty of my experiences and I'm loving myself more for not ignoring them. We can say, therefore, that this song is about self-reflection and the positive outcomes of honesty surrounding mental illness, something we have seen echoed in other Dream State songs.

Further to this honesty, the persona delves into the more unsavoury aspects of self-reflection and regrets. They say: ‘I blame myself, I blame myself/ For all mistakes I made in between/ I blamed myself, I can't blame myself/ All those mistakes they made me, me’. The persona regrets blaming herself as we can see this in the progression of the lines, from I ‘blame myself’ to I ‘blamed myself’, meaning she has stopped blaming herself, and ‘I can’t blame myself’, meaning an acknowledgment of the damage that would do. The persona understands her ‘mistakes’ and the harmful way of treating herself and knows not to repeat them, however they go further than that and present a more positive and uplifting way of dealing with regret. They are not just bad memories, rather they are formative experiences. The ‘mistakes’ she made, that she so harmfully blamed herself for, are now not shameful actions but important ones that ‘made me, me’. The persona has done a complete 180, going from harming herself through blame and regret for her mistakes, into accepting and acknowledging, and even celebrating, her mistakes, understanding that she is who she is because of them.

This is an immensely powerful way of dealing with regret, I think, and even negative experiences in general. Its Stoicism in the modern era, its celebrating mistakes because you wouldn’t be the same persona without them, and that person is so worthy of celebrating themselves for simply believing that and getting through those experiences. Such a journey of evolution is incredibly powerful and uplifting. On a side note, this modern Stoicism is shared amongst other rock songs, for example, my favourite is Rise Against’s Survive. which has the fantastic line: ‘how we survive is what makes us who we are’.

Like many other Dream State songs, the persona of ‘Monsters’ is speaking to another. Here this other persona appears to be a doubter, someone who would harass and demean someone for being honest about their mental struggles. The singer states: ‘I built those bridges that you saw on fire/You think I've lost it and my life's in dire/ Straight to the point, this is my vice, you know/ I'm not a victim, I am in control and you should know’. This other persona is clearly a destructive force, burning bridges and assuming the persona is lost, and a victim. However, I think it's more than that. This other persona is not simply another persona who doubts the singer but is rather a part of the singer’s own persona; it is, like in ‘Relentless’, a manifestation of their mental illness.

I think this is because the other persona burns the bridges that the singer built, as in the singer created avenues to escape her struggles or made connections with other people and these were destroyed by the other persona, just like social plans or ambitions can be similarly destroyed by mental illness. Furthermore, the other persona expresses so much doubt, assuming the singer lives a ‘dire’ life, and since earlier in the song we found that the singer acknowledges how a symptom of her struggles was blaming and doubting herself, then this other persona is that doubting voice; one that the singer also rejects, as they rejected blaming themselves. They resolutely and palpably state ‘I'm not a victim, I am in control’ and demonstrates this in the recognition their struggles are their ‘vice’. The song, therefore, functions as a destruction of the destructive forces of mental health issues, a rejection of that negativity.

The above stanza moves directly onto the next, which reads: ‘You don't know just what I'm made of/ You don't know just what I'm made of, love’, which further expands upon this overall rejection of destructive mental health. It presents a strong and resolute defence in opposition to that destructive force: an unbreakable object, built of feelings of recovery, self-love, acceptance; building materials that this destroyer cannot break, hence the wonderfully strong phrase ‘you don’t know just what I'm made of’. You, as a destroyer built on self-doubt, simply cannot understand self-acceptance and are ultimately undone by it. This notion of disrupting the disrupter is further exemplified by how these lines are sung is a more hardcore voice, just as we have seen earlier, this screaming expresses deep emotions and in this instance, I think, expresses power. It is the voice of someone who won’t be a victim anymore, the first voice of the voiceless if you will.

Thus far I have been exploring how the other persona in this song is a manifestation of mental health struggles, specifically self-doubt. However, there are complications with that interpretation. Mainly that there seems to be two personas other than the singer, the disrupting one and another more personable one and further to that there is a significant crossover between them.

One of these other personas speaks in the song, with a male voice, asking: ‘Why do we keep doing this to ourselves?’. This questioning tone, almost pleading in a way, does not sound like the destructive voice of self-doubt responded to earlier in the song. Is this instead, then, a friend or loved one of the singing persona, as we saw in ‘Hand in Hand’? This would certainly explain the anomalous reference to a ‘love’ in the previous line. If so, then, how do we distinguish who the singer is referring to in the rest of the song, a destroyer or a loved one? Are they separate entities or one and the same, changing between being destructive and friendly?

In the example of the chorus, the singer refers to another persona feeding the ‘monsters’, and how both ‘scare’ and ‘blame’ themselves and find themselves at a loss: ‘when we don’t know where we wonna go, or what we wanna do next/ what do you wanna do next?’. This section implies that there is a persona who shares the experiences of the singer and is, unlike them, lost and without direction.

Later on in the song, the singer states that ‘I will eclipse my former self/Just so I can better serve you/ I will love vehemently/ You don't know just what I'm made of’. The first three lines suggest a deeply personal and even romantic relationship between these two personas, going so far as the singer removing her former, we can assume ill, self to further their relationship. However, this is immediately followed by the line ‘you don’t know just what I'm made of’ which suggests that opposite, that this persona is in fact the destructive one, which begs the question, why would the singer express love towards them?

I think that this question because of its ambiguities can only be answered through such ambiguities and the inconsistencies. Inconsistencies from people you love can certainly be a source of sadness, and feelings of rejection and fear, someone you thought you loved turns out to not be that person anymore; they become, rather aptly, a monster because of the change. So perhaps the singing persona isn’t just opposing a destructive manifestation of doubt, rather they are opposing a loved one who became a manifestation of doubt, and they speak to them in the form of both a loved and hated one interchangeably. This would further add to the idea of moving on within the song, of new beginnings and acceptances of the past, of seeing the monsters for what they are but not staying to fight them and instead learning to live without them. The other persona must therefore be not two entities but rather one, at two stages in their relationship with the persona; a liminal monster in their own right.

Onto the bridge of the song, then. ‘Monsters’, perhaps, has the most directly uplifting closing lyrics of all of the songs we have analysed here, or at least on par with ‘Hand in Hand’, so I wish to include them in full: ‘And I've been sat in the dark for too long/ Holding all of my truth for too long/ I wanna open my eyes/ I wanna speak my mind/ And I've been sat in the dark for too long/ Holding all of my truth for too long/ I wanna open my eyes/ I wanna speak my mind’.

What other rock song lyric, I ask you, has more positive emotion behind it than these words? The repetition, the syllable count, the stresses, all combine together into this maelstrom of self-empowerment and agency, the imagery and metaphors of eyes, and minds, and speaking all construct complete internal, individual power, it spreads an uplifting attitude of complete personal control over all things: control over silencing, over sadness, over isolation, over lying, over addition, over all of the problems and issues of mental health that Drean State have spent their entire career singing about and combating.

The power of this self-agency is spread across the world to the audience of the song. The final stanza has a crowd singing along to final stanza. This section goes: ‘We've been sat in the dark for too long/ Holding all of our truth for too long/ We've gotta open our minds/ We've gotta be the light/ We've been sat in the dark for too long/ Holding all of our truth for too long/ We've gotta open our minds/ We've gotta be the light’.

This bridge alone brings all of Dream State’s music to ahead, it brings it all together and offers amazing alternatives, but not only that, these alternatives, this agency and self-determination, is given, like a gift, to the Dream State listeners. That's what is so special about this band, not only do they sing about how to survive and recover from mental illness, they give those realisations to us. The band is so very personal in that way, which also comes with the very nature of the topic itself.

Conclusions: Beyond Recovery?

There is some irony with ‘Monsters’ being the most uplifting and yet the last song Dream State produced with CJ at the lead, who left, along with guitarist Rhys Wilcox, and with bassist Danny Rayer before Primrose Path, for her own mental health. I can’t help but find similarities between this moment of departure and the final poems of Sylvia Plath. Plath, as some may know, was a fantastic poet whom herself had to deal with significant mental health issues, and wrote about them in a confessional way, very similar to the music of Dream State. One of Plath’s most personal and confessionalist poems was ‘Daddy’ which while presenting her own mental issues also ends on a note of something more hopeful and uplifting. She finishes her poem, which was an in detail exploration of the influence her father’s death had on her mental health, with the line ‘Daddy, daddy, you bastard I’m though’ (Sylvia Path, Ariel (2010) original published 1965, Faber, p. 50).

The ‘I'm through’ clearly shows a sense of departure from mental suffering, a statement of being ‘over it’ so to speak. However, for Plath it wasn't over, as she did take her own life in 1963. Now there are clear similarities between this final line and the closing lyrics of 'Monsters': ‘Straight to the point, this is my vice, you know/ I'm not a victim, I am in control and you should know/ You don't know just what I'm made of’. Now I'm certainly not equating to death of Plath with the departure of CJ, obviously they are not comparable, however it is interesting that both had these moments of uplifting, self-agency and recovery ultimately did not represent what ahppened next.

It's certainly not ideal for such a powerfully uplifting statement to be that last one of someone who untimely is not uplifted and has not recovered. But does that detract from the overall message of recovery? That's a question which we cannot answer here, but one that’s up for the opinion of the reader. Personally, I believe that it doesn't. The existence of the work, of the statement, is enough I believe. The art of the artists has more weight that the life of the artist themselves, al la Rolan Barthes Death of the Author which argues that, simply, that the art lives outside of the artist and that the art can generate its own meaning and worth to its reader or viewer beyond that value, or in these cases of Plath and Dream State some lack of value, that was ascribed on to it by the author themselves.

I think that no matter where CJ is currently at in her journey of recovery, her words of recovery have meaning in and of themselves to be worth amazing things to the people that listen to them, the same as Plath.

There are many more things to be said about this version of Dream State, there is the more personal aspects of the band members, of which there are more informed articles out there which deal with, but also the artistic choices of the presence of religious imagery and ideas, and the music videos which I think play around with famous psychologically focused works of literature, like the Yellow Wallpaper (1892) by Charlotte Perkins Gilam, for instance. More can certainly be said about Dream State than could be said here.

I think as anyone can see with the length of this article, my personal connection to Dream State is very important to me. I discovered them with 'White Lies', saw them live once in Leeds and was going to see them again before they split up. They are so very special to many others as well, I think for common reasons. That they are honest, true, uplifting and speak about the things that so many people, including myself, suffer with in silence. For that reason, they deserved this long analysis, as a band that meant so much to so many, they, as well as us, deserve special recognition.

Finally, I want to state that I love every version of Dream State, and wish the best for every member past and present. I look forward to seeing what happens with the Dream State of now, their new release ‘Taunt Me’ still carries that amazing Dream State essence, that mix of hardcore and punk, darkness and serenity. This treatise on what the old Dream State meant is as much a treatise on what Dream State will continue to be; it represents how much the band means to so many, and the support the band and its listeners give to each other.

This letter, this twenty first letter if you will, is not a letter of disappointment or of anger, as I have none of those, it's one of love and compassion, and hope, for what Dream State and all previous members can and will do in the future. I hope that this article can serve as a useful piece of rock history, something that we can appreciate, but ultimately move on from, keeping it with us in our hearts as we move forward as we do with the music that we love so dearly.