Mountains & Milestones, the latest EP from New York singer-songwriter Dylan Bowers, who goes by his stage name Caught Up In A Dream, is a beautiful EP that fans of The Scene Aesthetic will enjoy for its simple songwriting and poetic lyrics. The release’s opening tune, the title track, sounds slightly influenced by country music, but we are soon introduced to a songwriter who knows how to write tunes with minimal instrumentation, which is a quality that makes Mountains & Milestones a stand out collection of songs. The release is nothing fancy, just a vocalist, his guitar, and some light and breezy strings, which allows us to drift away to another world entirely, which is what good music should do.
The third song on Mountains is “If You Were A Deer In The Road, I’d Try To Hit You”, and while the title sounds cringe worthy, it describes the song well. On this track, Bowers has graduated to include handclaps on the tune to give it a lighter feel, though the lyrics about friends betraying one another really gives the audience the sense that Bowers is pouring his heart out through the lyrics. Descriptive, but simple, Dylan is a great musician as he gets to the point of his tunes very quickly, all while keeping the listener engaged.
The closing cut “That’s It”, focuses on heading out west, as the narrator wants to discover something different and give himself a new life experience. Going back to an acoustic setting, the piano which is lightly placed on top of an acoustic guitar and various percussion instruments makes the song one of the albums gems. While Bowers is still small time as far as the music business is concerned, he will soon make his way up the complicated ladder and finally experience success, as each song provides music fans with a fresh and new listening experience that will stick with them for a long time.
