Hypnogaja Releases Expanded Edition of ‘My Dreams Have Teeth’ (Expanded Edition)

Alternative rock band Hypnogaja is back with My Dreams Have Teeth (Expanded Edition), a 19-track release that takes their signature dark, cinematic sound to new heights. Out now through Snafu Records via FUGA/Virgin Music, the expanded album introduces four additional songs, bringing together alternative rock, dark pop, and powerful storytelling.

Made up of frontman ShyBoy, guitarist Jeeve, and keyboardist Nubar, Hypnogaja has spent years building an impressive career. From millions of streams to creating music for film, television, and video games, the band continues to prove its versatility.

One of the biggest highlights of the expanded release is "Wonderful Wonderful," featuring British pop artist Pixie Lott. The collaboration blends haunting melodies with pop-rock influences, bringing a fresh energy to the album.

Another exciting addition is "Sympathy is a knife," Hypnogaja's bold reinterpretation of Charli xcx's fan-favorite track. The band transforms the pop original into a darker, rock-driven release that introduces a completely different atmosphere.

Meanwhile, "Lost Days" explores the feeling of time slipping away, combining retro-inspired synth-pop with reflective songwriting. Beyond the new additions, tracks like "Ghosts in the Hallway," "Stranger Inside," and "Pictures of a Perfect You" explore identity, hidden emotions, and the pressure of presenting a perfect version of ourselves.

"Hypnogaja has always felt like home to us, the one place we get to be exactly who we are," the band shares. "Songs are their own language. If someone hears this record and recognizes themselves in it, that's the whole point."

With over 600,000 Spotify streams and growing, My Dreams Have Teeth (Expanded Edition) marks another exciting chapter for Hypnogaja.

The album is available now on all major streaming platforms.

With My Dreams Have Teeth (Expanded Edition), you've introduced four new songs that expand the album's original direction. What inspired you to revisit the project, and how do these additions change the story you wanted to tell?

We always planned to put out an expanded edition, sort of like adding new chapters to the story. "Lost Days" and "Into The Grey" were two of the first songs we wrote for the record, and they didn't make the original album. They were waiting for their moment, and we didn't even know it.

"Wonderful Wonderful" with Pixie Lott and our cover of Charli XCX's "Sympathy is a knife" were such nice surprises, and they really ended up driving the release. We also included the original full-length versions of a couple of songs. It all comes back to the title. Our dreams have teeth. They bite at us, and we get to listen to what they have to say without letting them consume us. Everything on the record speaks to that.

Your collaboration with Pixie Lott on "Wonderful Wonderful" brings an unexpected pop influence into Hypnogaja's darker sound. How did this collaboration come together, and what did working with Pixie bring to the creative process?

A lot of what we write starts out as a pop song, and then we dress it up in our sound. I've always had a soft spot for UK artists. This album has our versions of songs by Sade and Charli xcx, plus one we wrote with Pixie Lott. That's three British artists in the mix, and that wasn't even on purpose.

When we started recording My Dreams Have Teeth, our guitarist Jeeve had just finished working on Pixie's album Encino. She had a Fleetwood Mac vibe going on that record, and we loved what they did together. We were looking for something with that feeling on our album, and we wanted to do it with her. So we asked, and she happily said yes. Writing and singing with her was a blast, and it was exciting to hear our sounds come together.

Your cover of Charli xcx's "Sympathy is a knife" takes a recognizable pop track into completely different territory. What drew you to this particular song, and how did you approach making it feel authentically Hypnogaja?

I saw Charli xcx perform "Sympathy is a knife" and fell in love with it immediately. I think it's a great piece of songwriting, and she has so much honesty and swagger in her music. I also really related to the song. People often ask why our music isn't more well known, and they mean it as a compliment, but sometimes it feels like a knife.

I know the feeling Charli's writing about, looking at someone else's path and wondering about your own. We can't be other people. Everyone's on their own road. I love singing songs that feel personal, and this one did. When we were in the studio one day, I floated the idea of remaking it in our style, turning the synths into guitars. Charli already rocked it so hard in her version that it was easy to hear how it could work as a heavier track.

The album explores identity, hidden emotions, and the pressure of presenting a perfect version of ourselves. How have your personal experiences influenced these themes, and was there a particular song that challenged you emotionally during the writing process?

So much of My Dreams Have Teeth is about what's under the surface. We dove into making the record just as our keyboardist Nubar and I were finishing the score for Bryan Fuller's documentary series Queer for Fear: The History of Queer Horror. The series gets into why horror speaks to so many queer people. Those movies are full of characters who aren't allowed to be themselves, and the monster is usually the outsider everyone's chasing.

Growing up, a lot of us saw ourselves in that, and in the final girl too, because we've had to get past one obstacle after another to keep moving forward. I think that's how we learned to get comfortable with the uncomfortable, and you can hear it all over this record. Everybody wears some kind of mask to get through the day, and "Pictures of a Perfect You" is about that, the gap between the version of yourself you post and the one you actually live with. "I Need a Moment" is where the mask comes off.

It's a quiet piano ballad right in the middle of the album, about those days when everything moves so fast that all you want is for the world to stop for a second. It's just one vocal and one piano, so there's nowhere to hide. That's the most vulnerable song for me. Even the album title comes from one of its lines.

With your music reaching audiences through streaming, film, television, and video games, Hypnogaja has built a career that extends far beyond traditional album releases. How have these different creative experiences shaped your sound, and what direction are you most excited to explore next?

People call our sound cinematic, and I think a lot of that comes from writing for film and TV alongside our own records. We worked with Bryan Fuller again on his film Dust Bunny. On a project like that, you let the picture and the story guide what the music's doing, and we bring that same thinking to our songs.

We want every song to feel like it has a little movie behind it. And because our music turns up in so many different places, people find us in all kinds of ways, through a show they were watching or a game they were playing. Some of them write to us to say a song got them through something hard.

You don't forget messages like that. As for what's next, we're putting together our live show. Once you put music in a room full of people, you learn even more about the songs, and there's a whole new level of connection.