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Clubland Classix
Clubland Classix -
Track Listing
Disk 1Everytime we touch - Cascada |
 |
Disk 2Come with me - Special D |
Disk 3From Paris to Berlin - Infernal |
Brief Review
Clubland try to spark the attention of the hardcore fans and new fans alike with a 'Best Of' clubland package that, although it has some very good tracks on, just doesn't seem fresh. The mixing is near to awful on all the CDs, although there are a few exceptions. New fans of the genre will be delighted with the tracks on here, all of which have been/are in the charts and are a great starting point to the genre but hardcore fans will be left extremely disappointed with this 3 CD Album.
Full Review
Clubland are a label that you're never quite sure of. Their albums are almost always hit or miss; with a recent trend of just grabbing whatever's top of the charts at the time and slapping a Flip and Fill or Ultrabeat remix on it, hoping it will keep people's attentions. The highlight of the Clubland CDs are generally the bonus CD mixed by a DJ but evidently, this album is missing this--and it shows.
The first disk kicks off with a string of classic Clubland tracks including the new 'Everytime we touch', 'Logical Song-Scooter' and 'Set you free-N Trance' to name a few. If you've never heard these tracks you really should buy this CD as it'll be worth every penny but anyone who is familiar with these tunes will know it's nothing new and fresh.
Notably, 'The Whistle Song-DJ Alligator', known for the pun on "blowing whistles" has been given a clean radio edit which is disappointing as the original is much better.
The next 2 tracks just seem like fillers on a disk predominantly made up of Clubland classics. The lyrics do nothing to help the synth heavy tracks and the "hoovers and horns" drum beat effect making these 2 tracks nothing special.
Anyone familiar with Milk Inc. will know they've produced some pretty good tracks in their time but the logic of placing one of their mediocre tracks 'In my eyes' on a "classics" CD doesn't quite make sense to me!
This is then followed by the excellent 'Tell it to my heart-Kelly Llorenna' and 'Castles in the sky- Ian Van Dahl', 2 classic clubland tracks that definately deserve to be here.
As is the case with most clubland CD, the stand-out tracks on the album come few and far between and when they do come, they don't last for long enough. 'Forever-Trinity X' is one of the only songs I've never heard before until listening to this CD and I have say I was pleasantly surprised. Following the same formula as most clubland tracks, the synth uses a traditional rising tone with a progressive beat and small breakdown.
A disappointing remix of 'Forever Young' follows 'Dance 2007-Apollo' and definately doesn't sound as strong as the 'Tune up club mix' remix of the same tune. 'You're a superstar-Love Inc' is also another classic due to the amount of tracks on the 3 CDs, the 3 minute mixes of all the tunes don't do the album any favours.
Other classics on the CD include 'Fly on the wings of love-XTM' and 'Rock da House-Tall Paul' between a couple of tracks that act as nothing more than fillers. The first CD is by far the strongest of all 3, with the most well-known tracks but the mixing is a huge downfall on the album. The mixers down at Clubland tried to make up for this with an Ultrabeat megamix at the end of the CD but is, in my opinion, the only track that actually inherits any decent mixing.
The 2nd CD starts to dip in quality and progression of the set as it starts out with arguably the best track on the CD, the classic 'Come with me-Special D'. An excellent track well recognized as Special D's best work to date and the song that really got them on the map.
Styles and Breeze also feature on the 2nd disk with their classic 'Heartbeatz'. Female vocals flooding the sound system and a decent hands-in-the-air build-up make the fundamentals of this track such a classic.
'Take me to the clouds above-LMC', 'Cry-System F' and 'Poison-Groove Coverage' all follow this and are all arguably clubland classics in their own right. Although more recent than the mid 90s clubland sounds of some of the tracks on the first CD, the 2nd CD boldly shows that clubland still churns out some good tracks amongst the majority of mediocre songs on their CDs.
Yet again, the true colours of recent Clubland break through, even in their 'classic' album with a Flip and Fill mix of a Girls Aloud track. The song shows exactly what direction Clubland are taking their label and unfortunately it doesn't look good for the hardcore fans of the genre!
The rest of the 2nd CD follows much like the 1st CD with many classics, this time from the late 90s through to modern time. It's arguably a very good CD in it's own right but there's nothing new enough here to spark as much attention as it would have done around 4 years ago.
'Fading like a Flower' has a dance makeover by 'Dancing DJs' and hints to the 3rd CD that the album will start to dip in quality. And it does. Drastically.
The 3rd CD rounds off the album with recent tracks from around 2004 onwards and really shows the progression Clubland have gone through. The 3rd CD is very average and although there are some good tunes on here, the quality of the 1st and 2nd CDs over-shadow the first half of this CD with only a few stand-out tracks.
The most notable being 'Now you're gone-Bassfreakerz', 'Rise again-Breezes & Styles', the clubland mix of 'Chasing Cars' and 'Save me-Darren Styles'.
The end of the 3rd CD takes a turn for the worst and beyond as cheesy pop remixes and awful lyrical covers of dance tracks are brought forward, indicating the depressing state of the Clubland label at the moment. The CD then ends with the, now old and, in my opinion, boring 'bassline house' track 'Heartbroken-T2' that has been played relentlessly in a desperate attempt for younger audiences to buy into the new genre.
At the end of the 3rd CD I can't say I was too surprised by the CD. Bad to awful mixing on the whole and the tagline 'Album of your life' really doesn't hold true. It's like advertising Sprite as 'The Best Lemonade of your life'. Maybe it might but on the whole you wouldn't be sucked into the perception. Or maybe you would?
The 3 CD will mainly appeal to the younger generation that are completely clueless on the club scene over the past 10 years or more and is an excellent starting place to dive into the clubland scene. Anyone familiar with clubland or dance music should steer clear of this CD as there's nothing new here that you haven't got already on other CDs!
