"Dream Police" is a song written by
Rick Nielsen and originally released in 1979 by the
American rock band
Cheap Trick. It is the first track on the group's album
of the same name. The single peaked at #26 on the
Billboard Hot 100. Nielsen has stated that the song "is an attempt to take a heavy thought - a quick bit of
REM snatched right before waking up - and put into a pop format." Cheap Trick biographers Mike Hayes and Ken Sharp describe the song as "a magnificent tour-de-force, characterized by an addictively infectious
chorus and jarring bursts of
dissonance.