Best of 2014 The DIY List 2014: The War on Drugs’ staggering breakthrough year

The War On Drugs feature at #11 in The DIY List 2014, a look back at the year’s best albums, one-off shows, festival performances and achievements outside of the norm. Excerpts of this piece are taken from an interview published in April 2014.

The War On Drugs’ Adam Granduciel is wrestling with his own impossibly lofty standards of quality control. He could chat about music (mainly everyone else’s), touring and even his house (it’s the muse for ‘Lost In The Dream’’s artwork) well into the small hours. Garrulous and yet unerringly eloquent, he expresses the pleasure he derives and pain he endures from his art astoundingly well.

‘Lost In The Dream’ is the sound of an artist obsessing over his craft. With its ten tracks pushing the hour mark it’s an unapologetically sprawling journey, but it never fails to engage. The subtleties employed by its creator and production cohort Jeff Zeigler elevate the album from standard rock structures towards something approaching transcendence. On ‘Suffering’, a paean to simply getting through, unheard piano flourishes continue to arrive until the five and a half minute mark, twisting and turning the song into something entirely new. When its sixth minute draws to a close and disappears you’ll lament its length, but only for its brevity. ‘Lost In The Dream’ is one of those albums where each and every snare drum, every synth sound and vocal effect has been toiled over ad nauseum, and it shows.