Dream Academy: Push-Button High

NICK LAIRD-CLOWES (pronounced "clues") is the bright-eyed, revved-up type. He's eager to explain it all for you, and he's especially eager to explain that his band, the Dream Academy, is not Paul Simon Meets the Peanut Butter Conspiracy. Sure, young Nick studied songwriting with Simon, and if you sniff around you can probably scent a little parsley and sage among the incense and peppermints on the group's debut LP, The Dream Academy (Warner Bros). Nonetheless, insists Clowes, the Dream Academy makes modern sounds. "We're not a pastiche group," says the long-haired singer. "I'm not interested in the Stray Cats-type fifties revival or something; this is eighties music, a reaction against Howard Jones, Duran Duran."