(2017 Update:
Not much else to add to this old review. My thoughts on it haven't changed much in the ten years since I wrote it, and the story of Snap! hasn't seen much else of note happen either. They did join in on those 'I Love The '90s' nostalgia concerts that sprung up a few years ago, which is cool and all, but nothing from this album made it into their short playlists - at least, from what I've seen on various YouTube clips. I never got to go to those shows, stuck on the continent that I currently am. I'm not sure how they could have included Welcome To Tomorrow or Rame or The First The Last Eternity anyway, so drastically different from the group's biggest hits as they are. Maybe Dream On The Moon could have fit, having a similar 'rugged' rhythm as their older hip-house hits, but would anyone know that one? Yeah, thought not.)
IN BRIEF: The first mainstream trance album? Perhaps.
(to their song Who Stole It)
So, Snap!, what happened to thee?
You’re once players in this industry.
But something happened along the way;
Now your impact is forgotten today.
Alas, something did happen to the power-house dance outfit Snap! With ultra-hits like The Power and Rhythm Is A Dancer, they helped popularize a euro dance scene into a global phenomenon. At the peak of it all though, when work on their third album Welcome To Tomorrow was soon to begin, a number of factors ended up drastically changing things for the group.
The most glaring one is the absence of rapper Turbo B. Much has been debated over his worthiness as an MC. Some found him wholly unnecessary and his rhymes silly. Others quite enjoyed his faux Public Enemy persona, lending the songs he was featured on a vitality that was often missing from the many copy-cat acts that followed. Whatever your impression of him was though, he undoubtedly gave Snap! much needed stage presence considering most of the music was done behind-the-scenes. However, Turbo B and producers Michael Münzing and Luca Anzilotti (or John “Virgo” Garrett III and Benito Benites, heh) had a falling out. He wanted to get back to hip-hop, whereas they had other plans. Thus their union came to an end for the remainder of the 90s.
Yet that’s not the end of it. Snap! could easily have settled on producing stock euro house with female singers, but the German duo never wanted to be caught rehashing their former successes in those days - hence the drastic differences between their first two albums. Once again, they decided to go for a new sound, but what?
Oddly enough, trance provided the answer. It was already blowing up in German clubs in ‘94, and two albums with Jam el Mar at the helm (Dance 2 Trance’s Moon Spirits and Jam & Spoon’s Tripomatic Fairytales 2001) had shown some potential in the genre’s crossover ability. Münzing and Anzilotti also had ties to the scene, having known tastemaker Sven Väth when they performed together as Off in the 80s. Perhaps at the time it seemed like the logical course of action, but sadly Welcome To Tomorrow was a few years too early to be a successful mainstream trance album, and it greatly hurt the public’s response to it (well, aside from in Germany, obviously).
The lack of Turbo B was the least of their identity crisis. Snap! retained a signature murky bass-heavy sound throughout most of their releases, but not this time out. Welcome To Tomorrow’s production is mostly squeaky clean, even to a fault in some cases. If they wanted to create the image of a future where everything is devoid of the grime and grit of the present, they certainly succeeded there, but this was not what folks expected. Small wonder the new singles from the album were mostly met with apathy from nearly all their fans: they weren’t even sure if it was the same group anymore (which, in a sense, was true).
On its own merits, then. As a mainstream dance album with trance influences, does Welcome To Tomorrow work? At times, yes. Some of these tracks contain all those vintage elements trance was built upon, and Snap!’s offerings are as fine as anything the underground saw. Most apparent of these is Rame, where the combination of stuttery synths, sweeping pads, and Rukmani’s ethnic vocals could have found a tidy home on any old school trance compilation. Elsewhere, It’s Not Over makes for a peppy instrumental, The First The Last Eternity finds similar elements to Rame in a subdued setting with lyrics provided by their new female vocalist Paula Brown (aka: Summer), and Waves dips into ambient’s waters with Ibizan-tinged guitar provided by Markus Deml (whom some may remember from his pairing with Ralf Hildenbeutel as Earth Nation around the same time - the ties to the underground continue!).
A bunch of these other songs though... I dunno, friends. I mean, I normally don’t have much problem with doe-eyed clichés but seriously, Snap! go overboard here.
Green Grass Grow, It’s A Miracle, Welcome To Tomorrow, The World In My Hands: my God, but what syrupy sap these are. The World In My Hands is at least somewhat tolerable with a moodier tone, but the rest sound like they were written with children in mind. In fact, I think they were. Münzing had a baby daughter at this point, and it seems like his paternal instincts drastically took over his music writing, such to the point he even gives her some ad-libs on It’s A Miracle, a song about the joys of childbirth. Yes, I admit whenever I think about holding my newborn nephew, the same sentimentality does come up, but not when I’m listening to a dance record. Here, I can’t help but be just a bit embarrassed, like watching someone performing simpleton-silly googly acts to a bemused baby. And this comes from the same group that just four years prior had Turbo B rapping about lamenting a broken condom?
Welcome To Tomorrow isn’t a bad album though. It’s just very different from what you’d expect: a Snap! album, a dance album, anything really. You can throw it on and, provided you don’t blush to death from the effusive emotions at points, be reasonably entertained. Unfortunately for them, it brought the group down, and despite their continued attempts at comebacks this decade, they have remained out of public consciousness for the most part, save the continued replays of The Power and Rhythm Is A Dancer. Not exactly the future they predicted, then. Ah well.
Written by Sykonee for TranceCritic.com, 2007. All rights reserved
ACE TRACKS:
Rame (Beloved)
7 comments:
I was really surprised to learn, about 18 years later, that Green Grass Grows as actually just lyrics over the early trance track 'Superstring' by Cygnus X. I think generally, the album is interesting as it shows the Snap producers searching around in order to move Eurodance in the next direction (in the way that they had previously with their epochal singles The Power & Rhythm is a Dancer). Luca Anzillotti conceded to Billboard in 1995 that trends of electronic music during that era were transient, he was almost lamenting this. I think in this respect Welcome To Tomorrow is indicative of Snap! trying to be ahead of the curve, incorporate new sounds and develop things further. They also made an album after this which was scrapped, but two singles off it are available Gimme A Thrill and Angel (Rays Of Love). On both of these tracks, the more base-heavy production is back, as is Turbo B and new vocalist (whose name escapes me, but it's a return to the strong, more soulful 'diva' vocals). Neither of these tracks are anything amazing, but it does make me mournful of the fact that the album was scrapped, it would have been great to hear the album is a whole to see if there were any gems on it (let's not forget Colour Of Love was the first single from Madman's Return with included Do You See The Light and Rhythm is a Dancer so perhaps they're not great at identifying the best lead singles). They also released the odd song here and there over the subsequent years, again, nothing amazing, but I thought Beauty Queen was pretty good, and demonstrated again that they were never welded to the Eurodance female vocalist, male rapper formula that they helped create.
I remember Todd In The Shadows posting some inquiring tweets about this album a while back, and I couldn't help but think, "Oh boy, he's gonna' do a Trainwrecords episode about it!" Still haven't seen anything materialize, so I assume there wasn't enough interesting content to warrant an episode.
I see! I just looked at his tweet of Welcome To Tomorrow. Pretty scathing! Consider this - if you take the five ‘Summer’ aka Paula Brown tracks away, you’re left with five pretty solid tracks. ‘Dream On The Moon’ is very 16 Bit (their pre-Snap! 1980s project).
Ah, see, I almost think that's part of the issue. To the American audience who only knew The Power and maybe Rhythm Is A Dancer, 16Bit would be hopelessly obscure. Lord knows I hadn't a clue about that project when this came out. While it may have been a nice little call-back for those who'd been following the duo since the '80s, it really wasn't something that folks who'd jumped on in the '90s would care about.
I do agree this album could have had a fighting chance under different circumstances. Say, using a different project alias other than Snap! Maybe it wouldn't have sold as well, but nor would it have deep-sixed the group either.
(then again, if this hadn't derailed Snap! so badly, then we might not have gotten Saafi Brothers afterwards, so lose-win?)
Oh yeah, don’t get me wrong, I totally know the 16 Bit thing is very esoteric (incidentally I’ve only become aware of them retrospectively over the past few months. I’m kinda digging them!). Ultimately though, Snap! were destined for failure, weren’t they? Like all acts of that genre and time. But, to my earlier point, Welcome to Tomorrow shows that Snap! were at least being creative - experimenting with new styles, trying to push the genre forward; something I think can’t be said of many other Eurodance acts. I think this is especially surprising considering how much success they had with the well established Eurodance formula (and even more surprising considering they, more than most perhaps, had a hand in creating that formula).
What do you mean about the Saafi Brothers? Are you saying Welcome To Tomorrow influenced or inspired it?
p.s. loving your blog so much and I’ve spent hours reading your reviews.
A funny aside to that story is how Turbo B - who was critical of their turn to eurodance, remember - made a minor 'diss' track towards Snap! with Centory called 'Point Of No Return' ...and it's the most eurodance sounding track you'll ever hear! I doubt he'd fit in with a song like 'Green Grass Grows', but still!
Luca Anzilotti actually joined Saafi Brothers when the group reconvened after 2010. Guess when you're just hanging out in Frankfurt, all the scene vets are on speed dial.
PS: thanks, good to know all those hours spent writing them aren't in vain ;)
Haha yeah I heard that Turbo B track. It’s not bad. I also like the Penny Ford track with Soul II Soul. Had no idea about Luca Anzilotti and Saafi Brothers. Will head over to Discogs now to check it out.
There was also some teenie bopper project that had some connections with Snap! I learned about it via Michael Munzing’s YouTube channel. It is absolutely awful and I wish I never wasted 2 minutes of my time listening to that nonsense!
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