It’s October 2015 and round 1:30 within the afternoon on the Austin Metropolis Limits Competition. An early day set at an occasion like this normally requires energy to mobilize. However my mates and I are standing within the pit, excited to see one of many ACL’s greatest rising new bands on the invoice: British indie-rockers, Glass Animals. 

Their breakout single, “Gooey,” was using excessive on the tropical-pop wave that yr. With their multi-instrumentalist lead singer, Dave Bayley, the band had drawn comparisons to everybody from Ed Sheeran to the Police. They have been enjoying over 100 reveals a yr to sold-out crowds and debuting on all of the late-night packages throughout Europe, the U.S., and the UK. All the things was occurring for them.

Till tragedy struck. 

On July 2, 2018, their 30-year-old drummer, Joe Seaward, was hit by a truck whereas using his bicycle in Dublin. Seaward’s cranium was fractured. He required intensive mind surgical procedure and would wish to re-learn the right way to stroll and speak, not to mention play his instrument. Bayley, plus bassist Ed Irwin-Singer and guitarist Drew MacFarlane, scrapped all the things — the tour, the band — till Seaward, their childhood good friend, was totally recovered.

Two years later, Glass Animals have been poised for a triumphant return. The four-piece had been again within the studio making their third album — Dreamland — with the plan being to launch the title observe on Might 1, 2020. However then COVID-19 hit and everybody went into lockdown. As soon as once more, the band needed to maneuver by way of a residing nightmare. 

Now, a year-and-a-half later, Bayley is sitting comfortably at his desk in London, staring into his laptop by way of Zoom with sporting The place’s Waldo-esque glasses. His pandemic pet, Woody, is scampering at his ft. 

“Life isn’t essentially excellent,” the 32-year-old singer says. “We’re all a bit of bit fucked up, nevertheless it’s sort of what you do with that, and what you construct on prime of that, that makes you who you might be.”

It’s an apt sentiment given the unorthodox methods Glass Animals promoted their album when it wasn’t doable to tour. The group made lockdown movies, began newsletters, carried out cowl songs, held contests, and even wrote Instagram liner notes to go together with every observe of the album. Bayley referenced particular reminiscences, like of a classmate of his threatening to carry a gun to highschool (“House Ghost Coast to Coast”) to extra basic anxieties over surveillance capitalism and the evils of social media (“Tangerine”). For an individual who likes his privateness as a lot as Bayley — this was as outspoken as he will get. 

The long-winded posts revealed simply how private Dreamland was for Bayley, who hoped that his introspective journey would encourage followers to do the identical. The title even comes from a comment considered one of his lecturers rising up made that has caught with him: “She would snap her fingers and be like, ‘Dave come again, you’ve obtained to focus—you’re in dreamland once more.’”

Bayley stated this album is “most likely essentially the most I’ve ever considered myself.” And that it was his mom who identified that probing his personal experiences wasn’t egocentric, however what artists do to attach with individuals. “She stated that it’s extra useful [for them] than making an attempt to consider everybody else,” Bayley stated.

The album plunges into Bayley’s ’90s childhood, a sensory swirl of ice cream sandwiches, scorching pockets, blue hair, blood diamonds, mama’s crimson fragrance, the style of coconut, and Capri Solar. Dreamland was even launched on 90s {hardware}: VHS tapes, floppy discs, cassettes, CD, and vinyl. Their good friend made PEZ dispensers with their 3-D scanned heads (like on the album artwork) and their web site appears to be like like your laptop glitched again to 1999. 

Bayley went even additional, interspersing audio from residence movies on the album. The clips make a sort of sonic map of the place he was raised, from Grafton, Massachusetts to Bryan, Texas to Oxford, England, all earlier than turning 12. Moreover, Bayley writes for different artists together with Khalid and 6lack. However when Seaward was recovering in England, Bayley was always touring forwards and backwards and the frequent residence visits impressed the nostalgia behind Dreamland.

Bayley was additionally revisiting the artists that impressed him early on like Dr. Dre and David Byrne. He re-listened to albums by the Beatles, Nina Simone, and the Seashore Boys. Pet Sounds, particularly, was a significant affect on Dreamland. Bayley stated that he discovered a sort of newfound confidence listening to Brian Wilson’s masterstroke (“That document [makes] me really feel a bit much less alone,” he stated.) On tracks just like the synth-laden “It’s All So Extremely Loud,” Bayley considered the right way to convey silence from novelists like Jonathan Safran Foer and Raymond Carver.

The darkest tune on the album, “House Ghost” begins with, “I stated to you, ‘Why did you do it?’” The tune tells the story of Bayley’s childhood good friend from Texas who introduced a gun to highschool on the primary day of highschool, which might have occurred across the identical time as Columbine. The taunting lyrics contact on how the media on the time blamed widespread tradition — video video games, rap, and steel music — for the rise in class shootings. 

Playin’ an excessive amount of of that GTA
Playin’ an excessive amount of of that Dr. Dre
Doom, Quake, the place’d you get the gun from, eh?
Actually assume that steel gonna make you secure?

Opening up, within the lyrics after which once more on the Instagram “liner notes,” was a wrestle. “I at all times felt a bit bizarre, as a result of I felt like I used to be speaking about myself an excessive amount of,” Bayley stated. “I’ve had that drawback with this entire album. Like, ‘Am I speaking about myself an excessive amount of? Sure. Shut up, Dave.’”

Like every good musical recluse, Bayley pads the extra weak moments on Dreamland with loads of pop jams that Glass Animals can trot out all around the world on their subsequent sold-out tour. Among the best is a standalone observe launched after Dreamland is the appropriately titled, “I Don’t Wanna Discuss (I Simply Wanna Dance).” The music video reveals Bayley the place he’s extra comfy: sitting behind a boombox, watching individuals get into the groove from afar. 

And that’s precisely what occurred in actual life when Dreamland‘s piece de resistance, “Warmth Waves,” went viral on TikTok, the music and video streaming platform that turned ubiquitous when everybody on the earth needed to keep residence throughout the pandemic. The app is all about watching different individuals riffing on the identical a part of a tune and “Warmth Waves” has to date impressed half a billion movies pegged to the lyric: “Generally all I take into consideration is you, late nights in the course of June/ Heatwaves been fakin’ me out, can’t make me happier now.”

It’s an addictive pop tune, however what made the tune particular was the way in which it represents unrequited love as a sort of all-consuming climate sample that’s heavy and hypnotic.

Bayley nonetheless gained’t say what or whom the tune is about, however his mom’s writing recommendation served him extremely properly after all the things Glass Animals have overcome of their comparatively temporary profession.

“These songs are all about mates, household, and folks I knew and household,” Bayley says. “They’re about pivotal moments that trigger you to vary the way in which you assume, the way in which you behave. You see one thing and also you’re like, ‘I’ll by no means do this, ever in my life’ or ‘I don’t perceive that and I’ll by no means perceive that,’ and I’ll spend the remainder of my life making an attempt to know.”