Released in the summer of 2002 to little fanfare, Dreamland by Robert Plant is a nice return to his bluesy roots after spending the 80's doing pop music, (or so I'm told) and spending the 90's… well… aging horribly, vocally and physically. Dreamland is mostly cover songs, ranging from Bob Dylan's "One More Cup of Coffee" to Jimi Hendrix's "Hey Joe."

The album as a whole is solid. Not quite essential to the Zeppelin fan, but not exactly something a Zeppelin fan would hate. Fans of Plant's No Quarter: Unledded and Walking into Clarksdale work with Jimmy Page should be satisfied with the result. The music is based in blues, but given life by world music instruments, but not as forceful in those world music influences as Walking into Clarksdale was. Also, it is not held back by any real expectations. When Page works with Plant, it HAS to sound like Zeppelin to really please the fans. And since Zeppelin broke up, that has not been the target audience for Plant's work.

Musically, the album does not do any particularly groundbreaking other than combine some blues songs with some new sounds. The absolutely rocking "Funny in My Mind (I Believe I'm Fixing to Die)" uses the drums to a good effect. The beautiful ballad "Song to the Sirens" is probably the best song Plant has cut since "Ship of Fools." The cover of "One More Cup of Coffee" is great, too. You can't go wrong with Spanish influences, Plant's voice and Bob Dylan's lyrics. There's not a bad song here, honestly. Nothing that I would rate as being a must-have, though.

The album is only 10 songs long, and it feels very brief. However, thanks to 7-minute songs "Hey Joe" and "Darkness, Darkness," it runs almost an hour. The songs themselves aren't bad, but they are definitely overlong and, after the first 4 minutes or so, not really memorable in the least.

Still, nothing can really ruin this CD. It's too energetic, Plant is too talented, and it tries to hard to fail at all. However, the only people I can really recommend this album to are fans of Robert Plant's voice, fans of blues, or fans of the late 60's. In the end, it's an excellent album for which it is somewhat hard to find an audience. Go ahead and check it out, but not because I say to.