Los Angeles musician and filmmaker Kowloon has shared their first single of 2023 with the release of the glowingly groovy “This Dream.” Just last year he released his debut album Come Over, a collection of doom/vintage-soaked long songs appropriate for the age that he followed up with a few superb singles to end the year with. Taking cues from the radiant pop melodies of Peter Gabriel or the off-kilter but incredible hooks of The Talking Heads, the music Kowloon creates kindles a bit of warmth despite the gloom that floats in the atmosphere of his songs.
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On “This Dream,” that heat is owed to the scintillating riffs reverberating throughout the song, each overlapping like so many voices. Droning in glimmering ardor or spiraling quickly in a shrieking whine of ecstasy, it’s the symphony of guitars that glow near Kowloon’s woeful cries that illuminate them into something other than their current state of depression. As he looks around his town and sees the changes, slowly waking from whatever fantasy he’s been living, there’s this hard-to-shake hopefulness that ebbs underneath it all.
Like much of Kowloon’s music, he finds this exquisite intersection where the fog of nostalgia bittersweetly meets our own current anxieties and fears. And “This Dream” is filled with as many deliriously sublime moments across its kinetically luminous melody as it is with his prescient lyricism about people unable to connect with one another. With that stunning chaos of dizzying riffs that end the track becoming a perfect synthesis of Kowloon’s music as a whole: a cathartic and riveting release of dreamy instrumentation that is both weighed down and supercharged by the melancholy that lies at its center.
If you loved “This Dream” make sure you listen to Kowloon’s other recent singles as well! Which include the electro-surf-pop track “Back Again” and the slow-meander through the winding soundscape of “Today.” And if some of the music starts to sound familiar it’s because we’ve featured his music on our Best New Songs of the Month playlists!
Catch Kowloon live in Los Angeles on Jan. 25 at the Knitting Factory, NOHO. Visit Kowloon on their website and Instagram to stay updated on new releases and tour announcements.
Words by Steven Ward
Listen to “This Dream” the new single from Kowloon below!
