In Charge: Cat. # ICCD002
Released October 15, 2005
Track List:
1.
False Light (7:05)
2.
Second Bite (5:16)
3.
New Dawn (5:27)
4.
No Place For Silence (4:30)
5.
Calling The Shots (4:23)
6.
More Than A Life Away (3:41)
7.
Red Blue Purple (5:21)
8.
Stronger Now (3:46)
9.
Toys For Humanoids (3:43)
10.
Automanual (4:50)
11.
A Great Escape (5:56)
12.
Terminal 18!! (5:21)
13.
C:del*.mp3 (6:55)
Includes a DVD with videos, live footage, and MP3 sets.
(2010 Update:
Marco's career didn't quite take off the way I seemed to indicate it could have. I wouldn't go so far as to say he's fallen off but he definitely doesn't command the same attention he used to. Not that this album was the cause of all that -just a matter of changing tastes and trends, and Marco simply was unable to keep pace.)IN BRIEF: Sometimes it's best to just do what you're known for.Whenever I go onto certain trance message boards, I can't help but feel left out of most of the fun. While most of the inhabitants of such boards were going through the second stage of their EDM fandom -the part where you find a particular underground sound and cling to it like glue through thick and thin- I was already well into the third stage of mine -where you start branching off and exploring every other style the music has to offer. The side effect of this is you don't follow your initial pet genre quite as diligently, and many new names the next generation of clubbers are gushing over pass you by. So, although the Fellers, Liebs, and Jam & Spoons warranted my attention, the Buurens, Moors, and Gabriel & Dresdens practically gained fame without me even noticing.
Oh, and the Marco Vs.
Not that Mr. Verkuylen is new altogether, mind. Along with producing partner Benjamin Bates, he's been around since at least '97 under various guises, and Marco's been DJing for much longer than that. However, it was mostly in recent years that he began to get noticed enough to step out from all the pseudonyms and start producing under his own moniker. By providing hard hitting trance when light, fluffy melodies dominated, Marco managed to establish himself as a name to be reckoned with. His go at the immortal
Café del Mar by Energy 52 pretty much cemented Marco's place within the upper echelons of the trance community.
However, the man is quite new to me and, despite probably having the odd track of his floating around, this release is my first real foray into V territory. Having heard from pre-release buzz
200V (heh, clever) is a bit of a departure from the style that established Marco, this promises to be interesting.
While I've heard he's normally regarded as tech-trance, the opening pair of songs is anything but. In fact, I'm not entirely sure what to call them. Progressive would be a close estimate but there's nothing proggy about these either. In fact, both
False Light and
Second Bite bare some semblance to the Underworld of old with their pumping rhythms and murky atmosphere. These attributes are merely there to complement the lyrics to these songs, and it works wonderfully. Elliot Johns especially gives an inspired go on
Second Bite with a sort of old punkish warble.
This is something I didn't expect. Well, truthfully, I didn't really know what to expect, but a pair of aggressive, sinister vocal numbers that inspire some of the most deviant actions capable on a dancefloor was certainly one of the most remote. The fact almost everything that gets branded trance these days has become so safe and happy-go-lucky to appeal to as wide an audience as possible (yes, even a lot of tech-trance) makes hearing something as ominous as these two cuts a pleasant surprise.
New Dawn seems to start out in the same direction with the mayhem, moving into breakbeat territory to provide the backbone. This comes as another welcome surprise, but a cautious one as sometimes a producer may stumble if they attempt styles they are not as well known for. Marco doesn't disappoint here, though. Despite some questionable choices in sounds early on (what's that trying to be, a distorted sinewave?),
New Dawn re-focuses itself midway through into a pleasant bit of trancey atmosphere with soft pads and simple piano fills, never losing the initial momentum in the process.
Unfortunately, things start to get quite suspect as we move on into
No Place For Silence. It starts out promising enough, following the same form as
Second Dawn with menacing sounds, lyrics (although these are just loops of the title), and good rhythms. Some two minutes in, a little moody trance riff is introduced and, as the rhythm is effectively brought back,
No Place For Silence appears to be another good track. Yet, just as soon as you think it's about to be taken to another level of intensity, the song ends.
Now, maybe I'm just spoiled by songs that start out like this building to something more intense for a few extra minutes but this track feels incredibly short, especially considering the two openers didn't (which is odd since
Second Bite isn't that much longer).
No Place For Silence comes off as quite a tease, which might have been alright for one track but this happens two more times in the following run of tracks (which alternate between two types, the latter of which I'll get to in a moment). J’ may have bemoaned that one of the best tracks in Politics Of Dancing 2,
More Than A Life Away, was so short, but that's really how short the song is! And that, my friends, is a crying shame, as Bates does a wonderful little Karl Hyde impression. Along with the song's driving intensity, it could have been a classic anthem had it just been longer so we could enjoy it more. And
Stronger Now, featuring Elliot Johns again, is yet another wonderful little vocal number akin to
Second Bite that ends far too soon. These two tracks may not leave quite the gaping hole of energy at the end quite as badly as
No Place For Silence, but they certainly feel like wasted potential for not doing more with them. Sure, you can probably find longer versions on the singles, but you're most likely going to come away disappointed when you hear these shorter version on
200V.
What about those other tracks arranged in with these, then? Surely they can feed off the energy the short, intense vocal numbers provided. Eh, not so, sadly. In an effort to broaden his musical techniques, Marco seems determined to dabble in other styles. The results aren't inspiring.
Calling The Shots is a bit of march-a-long techno using more of those distorted noises the V-inator is fond of, but it's just annoying to endure.
Red Blue Purple starts out promising with some nice trancey pads and arpeggio work, but quickly descends into speed garage idiocy with hollow bass sounds alternating with farty noises. It sounds cool for maybe 16 bars before you realize, as with nearly all speed garage, just how musically bankrupt it really is. And do I really need to go into
Toys For Humanoids? It seems Marco wants to try his hand at some funky nu-school breakbeats, but his choice of bass ends up sounding as hopelessly clueless as the Icy Hot Stuntaz.
Having finally gotten past that tedious middle section, we get into something that's far more effective.
Automanual is a gimmick-free bit of techno, making use a distorted hoover pitched about as low as it can go for its bottom end and simple bell melodies to provide the hook. It's down, it's dirty, and, dammit, does it ever groove. Old school revival! More like this please.
Or, even better, more stuff like
A Great Escape! This is hard trance the way it needs to be done: rhythms with punch, driving hooks with spice, and melodies that don't dawdle on how great they are. Of course, Marco V introduces his main melody in a breakdown but the momentum of the track never dies thanks to all of the little subtleties hiding in the background. When it all comes back, the energy of
A Great Escape increases tenfold. It boggles the mind why more trance producers don't do this, as despite the simplicity of this structure, it is still effective. I guess if they did stuff this aggressive, though, their chances of having their material played on A State Of Global Deejays drastically diminishes. Thankfully, Marco V has other plans.
Terminal 18!! takes the grit of
Automanual and throws in a simple bit of spacey padwork to complement it.
C:del*.mp3 follows suite, allowing for more synthy patches to carry the song than rhythms, but even the nearly malicious use of prolonged stomping builds doesn't dilute the song's effectiveness. These two cuts are nothing fancy but remain miles more effective as dancefloor fodder than any of the more experimental tracks from earlier.
In fact, hearing this current run of tracks, I can see why Marco became so popular with folks who enjoy the harder hitting aspects of this style. He's practically nailed the template, making use of rhythms that don't disappoint and melodies that do invite you into trance. This is the same guy that did the idiotic
Red Blue Purple? Most of the music on the opening two-thirds of
200V feels like nothing more than a bad memory compared to where the album finished up.
The whole middle section of
200V is a perfect example of wasted potential, especially considering how good the album started and ended. All the decent songs are far too short to make room for songs that are just bad. I'll applaud Marco V's willingness to experiment in other styles but, as
A Great Escape and
Terminal 18!! prove, he's far better when he sticks to his strengths.
In all, this release is a very mixed bag. I can see older V fans dismissing it almost instantly aside from the last third, as Marco strays very far from that sound for a good portion of the album. The vocal numbers are quite good but, aside from the first two, they really needed to be longer to make more of an impression. The rest of it is unremarkable with the liberal jumping of genres on hand. Heck, I'd almost be willing to call this an ‘electronica’ album. Indeed, it seems Marco is aiming for a larger crowd than his hard trance fans. Sadly, this might end up being a mistake since the tracks that attempt to appeal to other factions of EDM are just plain bad (well,
New Dawn perhaps an exception).
Score: 6/10ACE TRACKS:
Second BiteMore Than A Life AwayA Great EscapeWritten by Sykonee. Originally published 2005 for TranceCritic.© All rights reserved.
