Slowdive’s Souvlaki is seen as one of the most influential and groundbreaking dream pop albums of all time by people all over, but it had not always been that way. Souvlaki is the second studio-recorded album to come from the English dream pop band Slowdive. Recorded in 1992 and released on June 1 1933 through their record label Creation, Souvlaki barely made it onto the UK Albums Charts and received much hate from the general public, critics, and music journalists everywhere.
To critics and music journalists, Souvlaki contained everything that was bad about shoegaze and dream pop. Most critics viewed shoegaze as a very insular genre or a genre that only celebrated itself which made it very hard for critics to listen to and enjoy Slowdive’s music. Dave Simpson, a journalist for the British magazine Melody Maker even said he “would rather drown choking in a bath full of porridge than ever listen to it again” which seems a little harsh. Slowdive took the hate that Souvlaki received very personal, as anyone would, knowing that they had recorded a beautiful album and were not receiving the love for it that it deserved. Although the band remained heartbroken as if they had just broken up with a loved one, they still managed to produce two more high-quality studio albums in 1995 and 2017.
Due to the immense amount of hate that dream pop and shoegaze received, Souvlaki was not able to flourish and receive the praise it deserved. Though that did not stop people and music critics of today from loving this album. To this day, it remains in the top 100 on popular user-rated music sites such as rateyourmusic.com and albumoftheyear.org and well-trusted music review companies such as Pitchfork.