STEVE WYNN RENEWS HIS DREAM

“Someone called me a grizzled veteran today.”

Steve Wynn laughed as he surveyed the Hollywood skyline from the Hollywood Boulevard offices of Big Time Records. Wynn is only 26, but as leader of the Dream Syndicate, he’s something of an elder statesman of Los Angeles’ underground rock scene.

Dream Syndicate was hailed in some quarters as one of the great hopes of American rock when its 1982 debut album was released on the tiny Ruby label.

Wynn’s intense, often dark songs on the album were fleshed out with dirty guitars and crunching rhythms that called to mind Neil Young’s best work with Crazy Horse. Things looked so promising that the band was signed by powerful A&M; Records.

But things didn’t work out, and Dream Syndicate hit its low two years ago when its A&M; album, “The Medicine Show,” was met with some hostility from once supportive fans and press. The backlash remained for a follow-up live album, and A&M; and the group had what Wynn described as a “mutual parting.” Frustrated at making no commercial, creative or critical headway, Wynn decided he’d had enough.

“I called every member of the band from a pay phone at Ben Frank’s coffee shop in Hollywood and said, ‘It’s over, that’s it,’ ” Wynn recalled. “I just didn’t want to be doing what I was doing.”

But these appear to be good times again for Wynn. Popular and critical response to “Out of the Grey” has been positive, and the band, fresh from a triumphant tour in Europe, is now off on its first U.S. series of dates in more than two years.

The road back for Wynn began shortly after the breakup of the band. The L.A. native collaborated with Dan Stuart, leader of the kindred band Green on Red, on the aptly titled album “Lost Weekend” (ironically released by A&M;). Adopting the names Danny and Dusty, the pair was joined on the LP by members of both their groups plus three of the Long Ryders. The album’s sense of spontaneous bar-room camaraderie proved just the thing to lift Wynn from his doldrums.

“The Danny and Dusty thing got the feeling back of having fun,” Wynn said. “That experience influenced everyone involved. It came out in the records (each of the bands) did afterwards. There’s a certain looseness in them.”

The project also resulted in a partnership between Wynn and producer Paul B. Cutler, who had been the guitarist in the local Gothic-rocking 45 Grave.

“I called Paul and asked him to come over and jam . . . and it felt like the Dream Syndicate that I wanted in the first place,” Wynn said. “So I kept the name and started up the group again.”

The reborn Syndicate (which also includes bassist Mark Walton and original drummer Dennis Duck) has a tighter, more focused sound than the earlier line-ups. Cutler’s disciplined guitar style is a sharp break from original lead guitarist Karl Precoda’s predilection for long, feedback-drenched solos.

Central to the group’s revitalization, though, is Wynn’s own maturity and bolstered confidence as a songwriter. The songs on “Out of the Grey” show a defter touch than earlier work with some added lightness reflecting the spirit picked up from the Danny and Dusty sessions.

Still, no one’s going to mistake Wynn for Mr. Sunshine.

“I could never be David Lee Roth . . . the ultra-cool guy,” Wynn chuckled. “But I can hopefully find all the garbage at the bottom of my guts and spill it out for everybody. That’s my forte.”

The one thing that troubles Wynn now is that what he’s been doing for five years has become almost commonplace.

“When we started out what we did was very radical and not very popular,” he said, noting that the original reason for starting the Dream Syndicate was that no one was making music like it did. “Now, what we started doing is fashionable. The day I sound like any other band, I don’t want to do it anymore.”