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While composer Jon Hassell is mostly recognized by prog fans as an associate of Brian Eno, it was actually he who first introduced to Eno the idea of incorporating elements of Eastern music into a popular music framework. While the fruits of this suggestion seem to have been largely reaped by Eno and David Byrne in their classics My Life in the Bush of Ghosts and the Talking Heads' Remain in Light (on which Hassell played), Hassell's own solo work has gone sadly overlooked. Dream Theory in Malaya is subtitled "Fourth World Volume Two," an extension of Possible Musics, his collaborative album with Eno. In this volume, Hassell recounts of two Malayan tribes, the Senoi and the Semelai. The former tribe's custom of "family dream-telling" (i.e., a sort of oral tradition) forms the basic theme of the album. Treated with loops and various mixing effects throughout, Hassell's unique trumpet style, inspired by Indian singing and loaded with portamentos and open-fifth voicings, actually doesn't sound very trumpet-like at all; more like a synthesizer with pitch-wheel. Throughout, Hassell never treats the aspects of Malayan culture with Western condescension, as if they were nothing more than the quaintly exotic icing on a cake. Instead, the ostensibly authentic Malayan percussion and splashing rhythms of the Semelai that form the basis of "Malay" seem as equally logical choices for consideration as a more traditional guitar or bass insertion would have. It is precisely this sense of respect and intuition for source that makes Dream Theory a successful album, and one that deserves new listeners. review by Joe McGlinchey — 1-9-03 —