Dream Of Life

Sound DNA

• Alt/Indie
• Alternative Rock

• clean
• earnest
• poetic

About

Released in 1988, <i>Dream of Life</i> is a collaboration between Patti Smith and her husband, MC5 guitarist Fred “Sonic” Smith. The pair worked on the record in segments over a series of years, delayed by Patti’s unexpected pregnancy with their second child, Jesse Paris Smith, in 1986. All of the songs on the record were co-written by the pair, with Fred sharing production duties with Patti’s old friend, Jimmy Iovine, who’d produced her 1978 album, <i>Easter</i>. Iovine had also helped her land a copy of an unfinished Bruce Springsteen demo for “Because the Night,” which had become Patti’s biggest hit. Still, “Because the Night” was by now a decade old. <i>Dream of Life</i> would need to remind longtime fans of Patti Smith’s powers—and introduce young listeners to her raw, heartfelt sound. As it turned out, the album opens with the song that would become one of her most beloved tunes: “People Have the Power.” As the story goes, Fred walked into the kitchen one night and said, “‘People Have the Power’—write it!” Fred Smith didn’t get to live long enough to see his title become an anthem sung by tens of thousands of people in dozens of countries—a tune performed in front of presidents and other heads of state—but it’s a hell of a legacy. The rest of <i>Dream of Life</i> is far heavier—at least emotionally—with songs that deal with the struggles of adult life (“Going Under,” “Where Duty Calls”) and the heartache of death: “Up There Down There” was recorded just after the musicians received the news that Andy Warhol had died. And “Paths That Cross”—featuring the lines “Paths that cross will cross again”—was written for Patti’s friend Sam Wagstaff, an art collector and the partner of photographer Robert Mapplethorpe, one of Patti’s closest friends. Both Wagstaff and Mapplethorpe were diagnosed with AIDS around the same time, and Patti feared that “Paths That Cross”—written to comfort Mapplethorpe—might also serve the same role for her, should Mapplethorpe not survive. But the two men also forged a deep connection with “The Jackson Song,” the final track on <i>Dream of Life</i>—a beautiful lullaby, one written for the Smiths’ first child, Jackson. It was a song that comforted Wagstaff in his final days—and, later, comforted Mapplethorpe after Sam’s passing.

via Apple Music

Tracklist

Credits