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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
The "Eagles" of club, smooth, easy, prog house, 3.5 stars, September 23, 2002
Back in the 70s everyone owned Eagles records. See, you might disagree over the merits, of say, Frank Zappa, but everybody liked the Eagles, I mean, what was to object to? In the same way, everyone into clubbing likes, or at least has heard, Deep Dish; and everyone's collection will and should have one or more Dish compilations. Its good stuff, and most people are going to at least tolerate it.What Deep Dish do well is impeccably prepare some progressive house with a sprinkle of other styles trance, a littledisco, soul, funk, tribal and electronic, and mix them in such a way that you can taste the different flavors without having to spit a track out, er as it were. They then bake this with an eye for truly catchy beats and hooks. There is plenty of aeration in the mix and a consistent mid tempo that doesn't get intrusive. All right, enough of the doofus food metaphor. Now, although Deep Dish appear on "dark deep/progressive house/trance" favorite lists in Amazon quite frequently, this collection is at best twilight than dark. It chunks and floats peppily, rather than dives truly deep, although its pretty sexy and atmospheric. Its free of glow stick anthems or happy! happy! house or club tracks; its midtempo. But its certainly not in the same deep, dark and dirty nay scary, category as Digweed, Graham (aka Quivver), Lawler, Saeed and Palash, etc. and cannot be compared to the same. However, "Moscow" is relatively deep and it won't have your "hip" friends complaining about "this dumb dance music." Be warned that just under half the tracks are at least somewhat vocal (beyond just samples) including remixes of well known artists, Dido etc. In part that is why you can give this disc to someone not into club music as a good entree, ("look Constance, it has a Dido song on there, you' like it, really!") Sady, this is where the cheese/fromage can enter, in part because club/dance vocals tend to be utterly banal and corny ("groove with me!" -yawn--). But still, if you can bear vocals in your dance mix, this one works quite well. (A note for all you dance musicians, give us some interesting words, for goodness sake.) The opener "Driving to Heaven" does just that. This a classic piece of cubby techno pop, really, a real song with a hooky chorus and suitable late night theme, so evocative you want to play it over and over: "My eyes were so dilated, the traffic seemed syncopated, and my car, turned me on" - indeed. I will let you figure out what its about.....Certainly an understated, moody, dark anthem for your pre or post clubbing drive. This then transitions into three catchy mid tempo progressive house tracks, before the sexiest female vocal in the history of the world whomps you on track 3, (albeit with one sentence, over and over). At track 6 through 8 Deep Dish move seamlessly off in a more tribal direction with a little move up tempo. Track 8 nips at you with an impossibly catchy tribally beat structure and panting percussion effects. On track 9 a pulsing more techno beat, moves into the fray. Track 10 is more of a forgettable bridge that keeps the mid-tempo vibe going; segueing into yet another very sexy, if a little cheesy, and overplayed, vocal track: "babe I have got my eyes on you, and everything around me moves". At least the mix is done in a minimal, techno and catchy way compared to the original mix. All of CD1 works well and is the best, 4 stars. CD2 gets a little more sappy, or a little more accessible and crowd pleasing, depending on your point of view. It launches into a pleasing late night techy groove ruined by the "alone in the dark...she came again" type lyrics, and an occasional Euro pop echoey piano sounds. Things then chunk along in a prog house way nicely, each one involving vocals, peaking at track 6 with "Autoporno" a manic, trance-pop, classic. The disc then takes a dive for the worse, with track 7 built around a sampling of the 80s Chaka Khan hit, i.e."Chaka khan I really feel for you" etc. I'm not kidding. I presume this meant to be so uncool its cool, but I think is a misstep, and ruins an otherwise fabulously mixed uptempo groove. The mood gets more spacey, intense and sexy through track 9, which has an evocative eastern style vocal sample, and is one of the best tracks. Sadly more ill advised too cluby vocals sully otherwise pleasing deep chunky house/trance. See? Something for everyone, and not irritating in any way, get the idea? Even I, as a deep dark trance/prog house fan find myself playing at least CD 1 of this compilation. That's the trick of Deep Dish: a knack for pleasing--or at least not annoying--a broad cross section in a dance music scene increasingly fractured and sub-genred to death. Still, too many cheese sprinkles on CD 2 for me, so only three stars. And I mean evaluated by the kind of up tempo progressive house compilation I think this is trying to be, not by comparing it to the deep and dark boys like Max Graham or Saeed and Palash. "Moscow" is the kind of CD you would recommend to someone who doesn't have any club music and is going to have a party; or some easy listening for the car with a few intense moments you can crank up when your not on your cell phone. I am sure it has, or will, sell millions and good for the Dish. Just be wary of its appearance on those dark deep prog house/trance lists, OK? And if you do want the "deeper Dish" try their "Yoshieque 2" instead, yes these boys can do it all, a more pure rather more grown up slab of progressive house.
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