Album Details

• Artist: Dead Man
• Album: Euphoria
• Label: Crusher
• Year of Release: 2008
• ME Rating:
• Reviewed by: solitaryman on 2008-05-18

Pop quiz (you get to answer at the end of the review): are Dead Man another in a long line of European retro-rockers to jump on that bubbling bandwagon, or are they taking that road in their own way? It's almost as easy as the easy feeling permiating Euphoria; it's almost as easy as the first flickering notes of "Today" to see the answer.

Hailing from the musical hotbed of Sweden, Dead Man have a very nostalgic and psychadelic sound going on, one that pays tribute to the jamming groove and soul of Grateful Dead, the proto-doom blueprints of Black Sabbath, the wide-open and atmospheric aura of Pink Floyd, and the modern indie folk of a Band of Horses. While it's hard to pin their sound down track to track, that makes for more varied listening and each of these 11 songs could stand on their own as good. While the mood is almost always upbeat, they do draw on some melancholy feelings on songs like "Footsteps" and the twisting Jethro Tull-esque "The Wheel". The vocals are nothing special, but at least there's no accent in their english. What strikes you about Euphoria is it's able-bodied musicianship, it's groovy hippie-branded atmospheres and it's retro flair. 

For all of the good, it's still not as easy as it seems to say they're ahead of the pack. Fact is, I've heard alot of music similar to this recently and most of it seems to come from the way of Sweden and neighboring areas. There's definitely a wave of nostalgia riding the indie scene nowadays, and Dead Man are both a worthy contributor to and ambassador to all of that. 

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