London (UK) based Singaporean singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist Jonny Ong has just released his latest single, Don’t Wake Me From This Dream. We’ve had the pleasure of listening to this superb retro feeling track today here at the Send Me Your Ears studio.
Don’t Wake Me From This Dream starts with a count in that leads straight into a full band sound. The harmonies in this track were the thing that stood out the most to us, with the whole track feeling as though it could have been recorded by the Beatles. The style of the harmonies in particular led us to make Beatles comparisons. This artist is clearly a Beatles fan (well, who isn’t?!) and you can clearly hear that it’s Paul counting the song in!
We loved the panned incidental guitars that add loads of interest and create a full listening experience. The drums are simple and barely change, save for the breakdown section, and it’s this punishing consistency that really drives the song along.
The inspiration for Don’t Wake Me From This Dream was pulled from a dream of Jonny’s, following a journey through a desert island and the galvanising allure of a figure in the distance. “I know you’re just too perfect to be real”.
There’s patches of this track that seem to take influence from The Kinks (think Sunny Afternoon) whilst the lead vocal has a touch of Michael Hutchence (INXS) quality.
We absolutely loved the rise and fall in this track – special mention goes to the break down section that floats off into a dreamy piano led atmosphere with cellos and violins. This section builds expertly back into a double chorus to the end, with a powerful higher vocal line being added on the second chorus, before a stinger ending.
This was a track that totally captivated us from start to finish several times. The chorus is extremely catchy and this feels like an instant hit. Well written, well performed and well produced.
Speaking of production, we felt there were a couple of slight peaks at around 80Hz and again around 140Hz are making the track a tiny bit boomy in the low end in comparison to the upper frequencies. We would suggest trying a couple of small cuts in these places with a small but wide boost centred around 4-5kHz to balance the track out a little. To be clear, the song doesn’t ‘need’ anything, this is just our ears preference. It sounds amazing as it is and, as we said, we all enjoying listening to it several times!
For fans of the Beatles and retro 60s sounds, Jonny Ong’s, Don’t Wake Me From This Dream, is a nostalgic and thoroughly enjoyable track that will have you hitting “repeat” many times.