| Product: |
Dreamland - Robert Miles |
| Date: |
21.01.08 (98 review reads) |
| Rating: |
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Advantages: Ambient, chilled, haunting sound
Disadvantages: Repetitive track listing
Robert Miles first conceived the idea of his ground breaking record "Children" after continually watching horrific news reports. The main road through the island of Ibiza also happened to be where a number of the biggest clubs were - and still are - located. Countless young lives were lost on the road, as loved up clubbers would make their way home from the clubs in the early hours of the morning, only to be mown down by psychotic drivers, off their heads on who knows what. The love of Mediterranean teenagers for their scooters was also highlighted as a major problem. Such teenagers were highly vulnerable to the dangerous traffic, as they would often ride with virtually no physical protection and more often than not in a high state of euphoria from the mixture of drugs and music that they had just tasted in the clubs.
The song Children was therefore dedicated to all these young people whose lives were being tragically wasted. Robert Miles believed that a period of more chilled out, mellow dance music would calm the kids in the clubs and would leave them in a much fitter state to go home after their night out. This is chilled club music at its most poignant - music dedicated to saving the lives of the clubbers who would enjoy it so much. In Miles' own words:
"This album is dedicated to all those people who seek emotion, reflection and peace in music....It doesn't take much...You only need to close your eyes.....And let the music take you away."
Of all the club music albums that I possess, few are as mood-driven as this one. I seldom listen to this album, simply because it is strangely emotional. This is not an uplifting album in the conventional manner as the music is generally very sombre. This is my ultimate chill-out album. When I'm stressed out or unhappy, I simply slip this disc into the player, sit down and relax. This is the most important thing when you listen to this album; if you play it at the wrong time it will be boring, repetitive and possibly very depressing. It's also a wonderful album to play if you're lying in bed and need something to help you unwind.
Only one track on the album features a conventional vocalist (One and One) featuring the vocals of Maria Nayler, whose career has since failed to escalate in quite the way many imagined it would. One and One is still in keeping with the dreamy, piano driven house music of the rest of the album, but has a more conventional structure that brought mass appeal in both the charts and the clubs. It's definitely one of my favourite tracks; Maria Nayler's vocals seem to complement this style of music so well. (Another track worth listening out for elsewhere is Maria Nayler's duet with Sasha - Be As One - a classic track).
The album spawned three singles - all of which made the top 5 in the UK - Children, Fable and One & One. There are two (not entirely dissimilar) versions of both Children and Fable on the album, though it has to be said that I get the impression that they were included for reasons of quantity rather than quality. Most of the tracks on the album are over six minutes long, so even with a track listing of 9 songs this would have been a fairly lengthy album. There is little merit in reviewing each track independently as the formula is almost identical for each (a steady, progressive beat, coupled with a simple piano instrumental, all coupled with various dreamy, trance-like sound effects). If I'm honest, the whole album is a little too much in one go for me and five or six tracks is about my limit. The music is consistently catchy though; even now I occasionally find myself humming a tune that I eventually work out is one of the tracks from this album.
So is a whole album of this music gratuitous? In many ways, yes, it is. The album is arranged rather like an epic. Although the tracks aren't exactly mixed (in DJ terms) they do virtually run from one into the next without a pause. For chill-out purposes, you could probably enjoy the 12" single of either Children or Fable but I personally think that some of the better, more haunting tunes were never released as singles, and so I still enjoy the album more. Around 1996, when this was released, the whole piano house concept took off in a big way, with Italian producers spawning new records like a production line. Only Robert Miles seemed to have any real empathy with the music though - the rest of the stuff was generally very unmemorable.
Following the success of Dreamland, Miles made the classic mistake of taking a bit of a break. When he returned with his follow-up, 23 a.m., the piano house movement was over and he attempted instead to migrate his sound towards more conventional house music. Sadly, he was infinitely less successful with this, and his name rapidly bombed out of both the singles and album charts. Nonetheless, Dreamland remains a memorable part of my music collection - and is a fond reminder of previous Balearic holidays.
Recommended
You can download the album at iTunes or purchase the CD online for around £7.
Summary: A soothing trance album for weary clubbers
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