Keanu Reeves.
Almost everyone recognizes the name, largely from the scores of movies in which he has acted — most notably “The Matrix” and the “John Wick” series. But some also know him for his musical career with the band Dogstar. Formed in 1991, Dogstar is an alternative rock trio made up of frontman-singer-guitarist Bret Domrose, bassist Keanu Reeves and drummer Robert Mailhouse.
Dogstar’s first two records, “Our Little Visionary” and “Happy Ending,” which were released in 1996 and 2000 respectively and are now nearly inaccessible aside from a few exorbently resold CDs, preceded a nearly two decade hiatus. Dogstar returned to musicianship in 2020, releasing their third album, “Somewhere Between the Power Lines and Palm Trees,” three years later in 2023.
Another three years after that, in 2026, the album “All In Now” was released with three leading singles, titular track “All In Now,” “Joy” and “This Sphere.” The record consists of 12 tracks, for a total length of about 37 minutes.
Stylistically speaking, “All In Now” is effectively identical to Dogstar’s 2023 record. Both are focused on vocals and just about every track uses a traditional verse-chorus structure. Furthermore, tracks generally lack notable displays of technical prowess such as solos, breakdowns or instrumental passages.
Domrose’s guitar work is entirely limited to rhythm and riffs, hence the aforementioned lack of technicality. The most interesting facet of Dogstar’s musical style is the notably audible bass, which is more out of the ordinary, as the role of bass is rhythm with other instruments taking the lead.
Sadly, I found that this uniform style led to most of the record blending together, especially considering the fact that Domrose sings in pretty much the exact same two tones for the entire album. He either uses a fairly standard, somewhat higher pitched and emotive tone, or a shoegaze-reminiscent style, the latter of which is only seen on a few of the choruses.
Due to technical simplicity, the record’s tracks tend to only be distinguishable by the lyrics. There are, however, a few standouts.
The record’s title track and lead single, “All In Now,” is overall very good. It has the aforementioned prominent bass which separates it from a lot of the other tracks. And the vocals and lyrics were some of the more interesting of the album. I personally quite enjoyed the storytelling and imagery the track’s lyrics were able to convey while still flowing well musically.
“Exalted” and “Wing” are similar. They were good enough to be memorable, and that’s worth at least a little commendation.
The only track of the record to be notably unpleasant was “The Whisper.” The chorus of the track is, “The whisper, the whisper / I miss her, oh, I miss her / The whisper, the whisper / I need to hold and kiss her,” which is painfully generic and uninteresting. The instrumentals of the track also feel more basic and subpar than those of the rest of the record.
Overall, “All In Now” is pretty good. It doesn’t do anything new or unique, but that doesn’t hurt the record for most of its runtime. It isn’t a masterpiece or fine art by any stretch of the imagination, but it was an enjoyable enough listen.
I give it a 6.5 out of ten.
