Hung Up On A Dream

I think this song is much more accurate in events than abstract considerations of nature and hippie spirit. To me is a fair clear description of the psychedelic "dream" state of communion gathered through some drugs consumption like mushrooms or LSD. Let's see in depth: "Just drifting slowly through a crowded street" time/space perception distortion (LSD/shrooms), "With neon darkness shimmering through the haze" exploded lights and color (LSD/shrooms), "A sea of faces rippling in the heat" image distorion/underwater rippled effect (classic LSD visual perception), "And from that nameless changing crowd / A sweet vibration seemed to fill the air" sense of communion/joy (shrooms classic perception), "I stood astounded staring hard / At men with flowers resting in their hair..." hallucinogenic perception/animated forms/stunnment in front of an alternate reality that you can really 'see' even 'staring hard' (LSD). And then: "Until I woke up only finding everything was just a dream" post effect, "That gave me peace and blew my mind" the clear state post psychedelic experience, the sense of gathering a 'pure' reality. "Sometimes I think I'll never find / Such purity and peace of mind again..." closing the song, the sense of purity and communion experimented is stared back longing. Word apart, amazing album, and beautiful song, got to love it.

Yes I agree with all of you. Though, maybe the song also tells about the dreamy nature of ideals. In this case the hippie ideal. It never became true, and the singer is just thinking he "may never find such pirity and peace of mind again".. only in dreams.

The dream of unity by the way.. wasn't unique to the hippies only. Many groups have dreamed of it, but so far its just a dream. And keeping all this in mind, this song stands as a blue eyed dream of a perfect world in the youths point of view..and I .. love it

I just found this site while looking for the lyrics to this song. Very cool! This is my first post...

I suppose I should preface this by mentioning that this is probably my favorite Zombies' song. I love the sentiments expressed, the composition, arrangements, the liberal use of mellotron and the vocals are sublime.

I guess my feelings are similar to those of Durang0 in the mentioning of the nature of ideals.

To me, in more specific terms, I think it also alludes to the nature of what Maslow described as "peak experiences". In his book Religious Aspects of Peak-Experiences (1970), he mentions: "feelings of limitless horizons opening up to the vision, the feeling of being simultaneously more powerful and also more helpless than one ever was before, the feeling of great ecstasy and wonder and awe, and the loss of placing in time and space".

We can all probably recall moments when an experience seemed to be perfect...a time when it seemed our place in the universe was that of harmonious and total integration. Unsurprisingly, for the composers of this song, certain musics provided this sensation.
Often, we'll go to that same place, listen to that same piece of music, et al, and try to duplicate and recapture that moment of transcendence and find that generally, it can't be done.

However, it doesn't mean that there aren't other equally exquisite moments waiting for us...I hope.

This was the guitarist Paul Atkinson's favorite song off of Odessey and Oracle.

It's also commonly described as the Zombies flower power song. I think it's the most 'psychedelic' the band ever got with a particular song.

I really like this song which is strange because i'm not really a fan of 60s beat or psychedelia. However, it fits both these categories loosely. The lyrics are indeed mellow and pretty but I wouldn't label it 'hippie crap'. :o

I love it. I love the music and the words. The Zombies, I think, had a very unique edge.

I think this song is related to art of dreaming. You know some things about the power of dreaming.

I really love the composition of this entire song. The piano, the vocals (are just dreamy!), and backing chorus... it all fits very well together.

I think the song is about the psychedelic era in general. A guy walks by, disillusioned, then comes across a new sound, a band who is playing beautiful music - like this song.

It's Odessey and Oracle, and this song in particular, that make me lament that the Zombies didn't get their fair crack at music. They could have been as good as the Beatles, the Byrds, or the Beach Boys, but the public didn't give them the chance and they quit. CBS records totally screwed them and pushed them into obscurity, in my opinion. This entire record was genius and pushed the limits of the studio 4 track. A shame it ended the way it did, but they went out on top, or as on top as they could manage, and gave us a great album.

Completely agree with Prabbit.

This song actually gives me this "peak experience" you're talking about. It's just perfect in every way. The structure, the vocals, the instrumentation. Just... gorgeous. Heavenly beautiful.

I find it a very beautiful thing that the song actually makes me feel and experience this harmony, ecstasy, integration, perfectness they're singing about.

I'm falling more and more in love with The Zombies.