This song is about a paranoid man who is convinced that his dreams are being monitored, and it's driving him insane. No matter what he does, the "Dream Police" are always inside his head and waiting to arrest him. Unlike the paranoia of, say, Black Sabbath, this song has a comedic element. Like most Cheap Trick songs, it was written by their guitarist Rick Nielsen, who creates lots of offbeat characters for his compositions, which keeps it in good fun.
"Dream Police" dates back to 1976. It was one of 22 songs the band had written for their first album, and it didn't make the cut. The song evolved as they played it live and refined it in the studio, and it was released as the title track of their fourth studio album. By this time, their live album At Budokan had been released, breaking them big with the single "I Want You To Want Me." The next single was "Dream Police," and it became one of their most popular songs, reaching #26 in the US.
A string section played on this track, which added an element of horror - those violin stabs are reminiscent of what we hear during the shower scene in the movie Psycho. When the song was developing, those parts were done with a keyboard arpeggiator as heard in "Surrender," but when they got the budget, they hired the strings.
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