Thirty years on, LA’s Dogstar prove they still know exactly who they are….

Words by Felix Bartlett | May 29, 2026

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Yes, he’s in the band. No, we’re not going to spend the whole review talking about it.

Well. Maybe a bit.

Quick catch-up for the newcomers. Dogstar are an LA alt-rock trio, reunited in 2020, comeback record in 2023, and now here with their fourth. Nick Launay produced it, which should tell you something. It’s leaner and more purposeful than Somewhere Between the Power Lines and Palm Trees, and it knows it.

Opener “Math” sets the tone immediately, Reeves’s bass arriving crisp and unhurried in the mix, planting its flag before anything else gets a word in. The record instantly transports you back to a post-R.E.M. era when radio playlists were stacked with the likes of Better Than Ezra, Live, and Toad the Wet Sprocket, which is precisely the point. Dogstar have never pretended to be anything other than what they are: three blokes who love a particular strain of 90s alternative rock and play it with genuine conviction.

Bret Domrose’s tenor and vibrato feels tailor-made for this world, and it remains the band’s most underrated asset. There is real drama in the way he navigates a melody, something between a less theatrical Ian McCulloch and a considerably less insufferable Morrissey. Title track “All In Now” is the album’s most immediate moment, quick-paced and fuzzy, with a commanding guitar tone that recalls Queens of the Stone Age at their most propulsive. It is the kind of song that sounds enormous at volume and will absolutely land live when we catch them basking in the Download afternoon sun.

“The Whisper” is a soaring standout that captures the drive and drama of a vintage Echo and the Bunnymen cut, while “Joy” stretches out into something more atmospheric, patient where the rest of the record sprints. Closer “Wing” takes its time and earns it.

It would be easy to get lost in the nostalgia of all that, but All In Now isn’t without its flaws. The main one isn’t unique to Dogstar: there isn’t a great deal of variety across the 37 minutes. Two tracks in and you’ve got the measure of it, and it doesn’t throw many surprises after that. Tight and competent, yes. Occasionally a bit samey, also yes. Some listeners will find that consistency reassuring. Others will want more to hold on to.

Yes, plenty of people will come to this record for Keanu alone. That’s fine. But what they’ll find is something more evenly shared than they might expect. For a man who could very easily make the whole thing about himself, Reeves is conspicuously uninterested in doing so. He functions as a backbone rather than a focal point, locking in with Robert Mailhouse’s drumming and leaving Domrose the space to do what he does. It is a generous, considered approach to being in a band, and it comes through in the record’s warmth.

All In Now isn’t a statement record. It’s better than that. It’s a band in a room, playing music they love, with nobody trying to be the most important person there.

Verdict: 💀💀💀💀

For fans of: Echo and the Bunnymen, Live, Queens of the Stone Age

All In Now is out now via Dillon Street Records