Dreamers of the Golden Dream (Vol. 1)
Recorded at The Woods studio near Woodstock, NY, Dreamers is the fifth album from Two Dark Birds—exploratory, dense, hook-driven, moody, exhilarated, comic, and open-hearted. Lyrically, it seeks out the meeting point between the inner life and the wider world. Musically, it’s boldly eclectic yet always swinging for the fences.
“Girl of Summer” sets the tone: a poignant portrait of a single moment—this moment, the forever-moment—radiating outward. “Good Boy Good” follows as a hook-laden pop gem (imagine Nick Lowe meets Spoon at Abbey Road), a rare salute to do-right guys. “Born to Fall” unfolds as a story of fractured family bonds, echoing both Sly Stone’s “Family Affair” and John Phillips’ Wolfking of LA. Elsewhere, the ballad “Sunbruise” drifts toward Cave/Cohen/Ferry terrain, while “The Law” delivers an American koan wrapped in blistering folk-rock.
The album closes with “The Song to End It All,” a true epic that begins with a hungover caveman in prehistoric France and ends inside a Bob Seger fever dream. Across ten minutes, it channels the anger, absurdity, and uneasy spirit of the times.
Stay tuned for Volume 2—arriving Summer 2026.
Two Dark Birds is a band from the Catskill Mountains led by songwriter Steve Koester and drummer Jason Mills. They are joined by Josh Roy Brown (lap steel), Tyler Wood (keys), Iris Clementine (vocals), Mark Lerner (bass), Jeff Hill (bass). Since 2008, they have released four critically acclaimed albums, as well as the 2022 EP Porous.
Prior to Two Dark Birds, Koester fronted the bands Punchdrunk, Koester, and Maplewood. The music has been called “knockout gorgeous” and “timeless… great rock music” and has received glowing reviews everywhere from Fader and Nylon to The Village Voice and The New York Times, showing up on year-end Best Of lists in Magnet, Popmatters, Rhapsody, Disclaimer and more. Koester has also written, recorded and produced a wide variety of songs for TV and film.
