Written by Janlor Encarnacion

The OPM landscape has a never-ending list of bands singing about love and all its tangents. A band can find success just by sticking to this topic and avoiding any deviation from it. Signed to O/C Records back in 2018, Drive of Daydreams released their debut album – Daydreams Vol. 1 – with a collection of previously released singles and new songs while referencing the past overusing tropes to mixed results.

All the songs in the album are your typical OPM songs talking about love and heartbreak that you may have already listened to in the 90’s and 00’s albeit with more modern sounding vocals. That is to say, they bypass the shout-along choruses you’d normally associate with these kinds of songs and deploy a more subdued vocal performance to mixed results. The opening song – Come With Me – is the best song on the album and sets the bar high where the rest of the songs fall short except for one. Taking cues from British bands like Oasis, the song has a great arrangement and is a banger opening track. The succeeding tracks fall short even if they try to pay homage to popular bands in the 90’s: Join the Club in Giliw, Spongecola in K.L.A., Itchyworms in L.D.R., and Silent Sanctuary in Wag Ka Lang Malumbay. But there is a glimmer of hope – Martyr. It shows the bands’ ability to shift from multiple genres and styles with great effect and shows the potential of the band where only glimpses can be seen in the other songs.

Paying homage to the past is always a good starting point for any up-and-coming band but it’s always best to make your own mark – especially in the oversaturated space that the band is trying to make a name in. The album shows potential and we can only hope that this experience will help the band and their music grow in the hopes that the band can snap out of their own daydream and make a difference.

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