Youth Dream in the Room - After the Fire

There is literally no information available online for Western readers looking into Youth Dream in the Room. From what I gather, they're a Japanese emo band who have been playing shows for a few years, and "After the fire" is their debut release. That's all I got! With that said, I guess the music is just gonna have to stand on its own here.

"After the fire" opens with the track "Sorekara", rife with thick power chords and strained, emotional vocals. It's a little bit messy, but there's a lot of passion and energy to be found here. "Rattoman" have a little bit of a mellow pop punk vibe, but the vocals remind me more of The Pillows in their earlier days.

The third track, "Umbrella", opens up with a somber beat and crooning vocals. The longest song on the EP, "Umbrella" twists between gentler verses and heavy choruses. There's a hint of Number Girl in this one, which actually permeates the entire release to be honest. The sense of melody, passion, and energy all overtake the messy production and technical skill. Youth Dream in the Room sound like a true garage band, and in all honesty they probably are.

"Thursday" is probably the cleanest song on the record. It also has my favorite hook on the tracklist, so that's a plus. If the last song reminded me of Number Girl just a bit, this song SCREAMS Number Girl, or even a very early ASIAN KUNG-FU GENERATION demo??? It's really strong overall, I do wish the production was cleaner but I bet this song kills in a live environment. By the time the bridge comes along, we get an INCREDIBLY Dinosaur Jr.-esque solo. This band wears their influences on their sleeve quite proudly.

The closer is "Green Gay Boruso", which is pretty similar to the opener in terms of composition and tone. It's not particularly memorable for me, but I have to admit that it's probably the production. I can imagine it being great live, though, and it does have a lot of energy.

I would love to hear more from Youth Dream in the Room! There's not much to go by here, and I'm honestly confused as to whether or not they're even an active band right now (while this release was put on Bandcamp just this weekend, the band's official Twitter has no posts after 2014). Here's hoping they keep it up and bring something even stronger to the table next time!

​-Justin

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