Dreams So Real

Dreams So Real
L - R: Worsham, Allen, Marler
Background information
Origin	Athens, Georgia, USA
Genres	Rock, alternative
Years active	1983-1993
Labels	Arista Records
Website	Dreams So Real on MySpace Yahoo! Group for Dreams So Real

Dreams So Real is an alternative rock band from Athens, Georgia, who gained some national exposure in the late 1980s and early 1990s, including releases on Arista Records.

History

The trio is led by songwriter Barry Marler on lead vocals and guitar, with Trent Allen on bass and backing vocals and Drew Worsham on drums. Sheryl Crow guitarist Peter Stroud was a member during the band's later years. Formed in 1983 when its members met in an Athens record store, their debut single, "Everywhere Girl" produced by Peter Buck of R.E.M., was released in 1985 and was very successful at college radio. Buck also produced their first full-length album, 1986's Father's House. The band gained a bit more exposure by performing their song "Golden" (called "Steps" in the movie's end notes) in Athens, GA. Inside/Out , a rock documentary on their hometown music scene.

Dreams So Real signed to Arista Records and released Rough Night in Jericho in 1988. The title track earned some success, reaching #28 on the Billboard Mainstream Rock Chart and receiving heavy MTV airplay. A follow-up single, "Bearing Witness" also cracked Billboard's Rock Chart. The album would reach the Billboard Hot 200, peaking at #150.^[1]

The 1990 follow-up album, Gloryline, met with less success both critically and commercially. Soon after, Arista dropped the band and Dreams So Real soon drifted apart. As a kind of parting gift, the band released a collection of outtakes, rarities and B-sides titled Nocturnal Omissions, made available through their fan-club mailing list, and while on tour.

After the breakup

Marler and Allen briefly reformed with the band Ether in the late 1990s, but have since appeared to have mostly left music behind at the time. Marler is an analyst at the University of Georgia's Center for Applied Genetic Technologies, while Allen became a graphic artist and later entered the business world as president of Baseline SportsMedia, Inc., a company specializing in graphic design and event photography at professional and collegiate sporting events.

The band received mention in a number of R.E.M. biographies detailing their success and importance to the scene, including Marcus Gray's It Crawled from the South and David Buckley's R.E.M.: Fiction. Dreams So Real also appears in the "Athens, GA - Inside Out" movie, which is available on DVD.

In 2003, Worsham was shot in the head by a man who was reported to be his girlfriend's ex-boyfriend. Reports said the man, Joel Chris Blankenship, subsequently kidnapped and fatally shot the girlfriend, Dara Jo Wasdin, before putting a bullet through his own head. Worsham survived, as the bullet lodged in his eye socket and never reached his brain, and reportedly recovered to return to his post-Dreams So Real music projects as well as his work as a computer technician.^[2]

Return

Dreams So Real recently announced on their MySpace site, that they will reunite for the first time in a decade on Sunday, June 28, 2009, at Athfest 2009, a music and arts festival held annually in downtown Athens, Georgia. It is unknown at this time if the band will reunite for one night only, or will come back.^[3]

Discography

• Everywhere Girl (b/w Whirl - 45 rpm single) - 1985
• Father's House - Coyote Records - 1986
• Rough Night in Jericho - Arista Records - 1988
• Gloryline - Arista Records - 1990
• Nocturnal Omissions - Self-released - 1992

References

• Allmusic
• Jan. 1, 2004 Creative Loafing article

Inline References