Dremnt the End

A new Cure classic – last week’s 4:13 Dream – ionizes the air around it, but Dremnt the End opener “Stuck in the Love” ingested Robert Smith long before a disco ball lit the cover of this local quartet’s eponymous CD. Million-dollar production from credit Svengali Will Hoffman (engineer, mixer, programmer) booms shimmering mid-1980s UK rock with expert evocation. “It was a flashback-lunch drive,” nods “Time Out” un-self-consciously, “sit back and think of yesterday.” If Dremnt the End aspires to nothing else, the seamless verve and major label muscle with which it accomplishes exactly that is undeniably impressive for an indie concern. Big, riff-pierced uptempos “Aha” and “The Inside” stand tall alongside the watery current pulsing on “I Want It,” though insistent pledge “Pure” raises the specter of mid-1990s flashback glams Sponge. Too long by 10 minutes, this rollout nevertheless evinces nary a chink in its mirrored armor.

**.5

This article appears in November 7 • 2008.

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San Francisco native Raoul Hernandez crossed the border into Texas on July 2, 1992, and began writing about music for the Chronicle that fall, debuting with an album review of Keith Richards’ Main Offender. By virtue of local show previews – first “Recommendeds,” now calendar picks – his writing’s appeared in almost every issue since 1993.