Craig Walker of Power Of Dreams: 'It was a golden age. Now, it’s music by committee'
Power of Dreams.
The new album from Power of Dreams is a lovingly-crafted time capsule. Fuzz-drenched guitars beam in straight from an indie disco of 30 years ago. Accompanying this retro rumble are lashings of reverb and hints of shoegaze-style distortion. And when frontman Craig Walker sings, the decades fall away in earnest so that 2021 becomes 1991.
“We were a 1990s band – it’s obviously going to have touches of that,” says Walker of Aüslander, the group’s fifth LP.
“It was important that it did. Erik Alcock, who produced, said, ‘I could throw loads of stuff on’. But it wouldn’t sound like Power Of Dreams.”
“Sounding like Power Of Dreams” means something very specific. Released after a frantic record label bidding war, their 1990 debut, Immigrants, Emigrants and Me was the missing link in Irish rock between U2’s Under A Blood Red Sky and My Bloody Valentine’s Loveless.
And yet Power of Dreams belonged to the 1990s as much as they did to the Dublin indie scene and were tuned to the same frequencies as Pavement and Sonic Youth. Their music was earnest, yearning – but brimming with a Gen X determination to break with the past and forge a new future.
That glittering future never quite arrived. Along with A-House, Fatima Mansions and Whipping Boy, they become one of the the great “what ifs?” of 1990s Irish rock. What if the reviews in the UK and America had been just a little better? What if they’d had a hit? What if their label had given them the time and space to find their audience?
Walker, who resides in Berlin and has lived through several musical lifetimes, doesn’t have any regrets. He is anxious, though, that Power of Dreams aren’t forgotten. That their name is invoked when people talk about the important Irish bands of the post-U2 era. And in outfitting Aüslander with the classic Power of Dreams trappings of anthemic guitars and earnest vocals he hopes to go some way towards that goal.
“I’m very proud of what we achieved. The older I get, the prouder I am. Having been in the industry for decades now, I know that we were probably the last generation where the labels were not enforcing teams of songwriters on new acts. They were still looking for people who wrote their own music. It was a golden age. Now, it’s music by committee.”
Putting out Aüslander has been hugely emotional. The record was recorded in lockdown with the individual musicians - including Cork guitarist Ian Olney - scattered across the continents, which obviously made for an intense and disconcerting experience. However, there was tragedy, too. On New Year’s Eve, former Power of Dreams guitarist Robbie Callan passed away after a short illness.
“He never got to hear the album,” says Walker. “He was a special guy. I would have been 15 when I met Robbie. He was 17. That’s a huge gap at that age. He had a studio at the back of his parents’ house in Harold’s Cross, where we could rehearse. Robbie had done a lot of gigs by that point. He was a lot more seasoned than us.”
Walker was still in school when he formed the Power of Dreams with his brother Keith (on drums). In the late Eighties, Dublin had become a musical hot-bed thanks to the success of U2. Hence a rush to sign Power of Dreams. Just 17 years-old, Walker would fly to London to take meetings with figures such as Geoff Travis of Rough Trade.
“We were part of the first wave of Irish bands getting signed on a big scale. And all thanks to U2,” he says. “People knock U2 all the time. But a light bulb went off for me when I saw there was a band like that in Ireland, killing it all over the world. They brought attention to the country. I did slag them off back in the day.” He took potshots at Bono and chums not because he disapproved of their music or envied their success. He was just fed up of their name being constantly invoked in the context of Power of Dreams.
“I got sick of being asked – ‘so are you the next U2’? Being young and cocky, I thought, ‘I’m not going to love them like everyone else does’. And started being a bit mouthy. It’s up to the youngsters to kick the arse of the oldsters. Five years later Oasis came along and started slagging off everybody. You don’t want boring you pop stars.”
Power of Dreams drifted apart in 1995, having failed to make a breakthrough. “We had done four albums. I was 24 when we split. It was all over. The first career I’d had was done. It was pretty weird.” He wasn’t devastated. In its latter stages, Power of Dreams had become a bit of a drag. The dream of making music had been replaced by the expectation that they should achieve commercial success. It’s a place no band wants to be. “By the second album, the pressure was on. We had a & r guy coming down: ‘lads we need a hit’. And I was like, ‘Shit, I don’t even know what that is’.”
Walker would eventually put Power of Dreams back together even as he continued other projects. There is his solo outfit, Craig Walker + The Cold. He has recorded with Cologne techno duo Booka Shade and with Mindmap, the label run by Kraftwerk’s Fritz Hilpert. But in the 1990s he appeared to have a second shot at mainstream stardom as he and ex-Sultans of Ping drummer Morty McCarthy formed Pharmacy, together with former Power of Dreams guitarist Ian Olney.
“We were going to get [Nirvana collaborator] Butch Vig to produce our album. We had meetings with two or three big producers. We were going to record in America,” he recalls.
“And then, on the night we signed the deal, the boss of the company got a call. He came back an hour later white as a ghost. ‘Guys you’re not going to believe this – the label had gone into chapter 23’ [i.e. filed for bankruptcy]. That was the end of the band.”
He isn’t bitter. In fact, in his late 40s, he is as enthusiastic about music as ever. And you can hear it on Aüslander. It’s a record that takes something old – jangling indie rock with hearts worn on both sleeves – and makes it glittering and new.
And, if there is any justice, it will restore Power of Dreams to their deserved place among the great Irish bands of the 1990s. Even if it doesn’t, Power of Dreams fans will cherish it as a comeback more than worth the wait.
Aüslander is out now
