@jonattonyeah This list reminds me of why passed 2002 or so, I only ever listened to 3 or 4 of essential mixes a year. There’s a ton of unlistenable garbage there, I’m impressed you got through all of it.
2004 Essential Mixes - RANKED
Saw Zabiela play on NYD in Sydney in 2005 and he was ace tbf.
Not a patch on Lee Coombs though.
Agree that Zabiela Syntax/Wrecked Angle finale into the Vanilla Sky sample is absolutely mustard. Blew my away at the time.
No doubt.
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Kudos for managing to get through all these, including the many shite ones. How many days/weeks etc. did it take?!
- Switch
Like Deep Dish, Switch should know better and gets docked accordingly. One of the better producers at the time who just completely loses this mix in the middle.
As you say he was really taking off as a producer then and I saw him play a couple of times in that era and enjoyed his sets, so I was curious to see you say this about his EM. I skimmed through it out of curiosity and by heck you’re right! What the heck was he thinking in that mid-section? Dull as dishwater.
jonattonyeah 35. Dave Clarke
I’m usually a defender of this arrogant weirdo but this is just a racket. His schizophrenic mixing style has worked in the past but this mix just falls flat.
Dude wtf? Sure it’s not as good as his 2000 EM, but I still rinsed this at the time. It’s a very good mix. Heck, it deserves top 5 just for that bit with UR - Transition alone.
jonattonyeah FAVORITE TRACK:
Mutiny - Dem Girls (Solid Groove Mix) [Underwater]
Lol, this brings back memories - this was one of my fav tracks to play at house parties (when I was more in to house music).
jonattonyeah The mixing is on point and my favorite track, from one of my go-to production teams around then, I’d never heard before. Proper chugger.
FAVORITE TRACK:
Peace Division - Take Me I’m Yours [Low Pressings]
You’ve posted a youtube link to the wrong version of the track btw. I don’t know what version Behrouz uses though, could be unreleased given that EP was titled ‘Unreleased Projects Remixed’.
Bizarrely enough, 6 months ago I searched for another, even better version of this track - which was a version I’d remembered hearing at the time somehow - and the only trace of it I found was in the youtube vid below. I asked the guy who uploaded the vid where he got the track from and he answered like an unhelpful twat:
jonattonyeah This mix gets docked for an awful, awful Sander K song. I was on public transportation and my mouth was agape. It’s so bad. Given how good the “4 Seasons” EP is, and the expectations following, I don’t really have any problem saying “The Right Time” is one of the worst songs ever produced given the supposed talent therein.
Dear god, it’s even worse than ‘The Fruit’! I didn’t think that was possible.
jonattonyeah 10 & 9 (played twice). Above & Beyond
jonattonyeah Docked for being Trance for people who like Prog and Prog for people who like Trance.
jonattonyeah FAVORITE TRACK:
It’s just trance and I can’t be fussed to go through it again.
Lol, the middle part about why you “docked” this mix is so true.
But on that note, “favorite track” should really be Probspot "Foreplay’, released on Hooj’s sister label Lost Language. It really embodies the description of the music you posted. It’s a really well produced, big tune; enough so that I even bought the vinyl and liked listening to it. However, it remains possibly the softest and cheesiest prog/trance track I’ve ever bought, and I could never fit it in to any mixes.
It deserves some major credit though for predating that big Deadmau5 / Kaskade etc. heavily-sidechained warm trance pads sound by a full 2 years. It’s really quite remarkable to the point where I wonder if it directly influenced deadmau5′ productions.
jonattonyeah 6. Paolo Mojo
Yes I enjoyed this mix at the time. Good choice of favourite track as well; another one I also had the vinyl of.
jonattonyeah 3. Desyn Masiello
This was great, I listened to it a lot. I’d have put it at 2 behind Dave Clarke. It was really fresh at the time and still sounds pretty unique. For that brief period Desyn was one of a very few DJs who made the more electro-ish direction dance music was heading in at that time actually sound good. “Favorite track” has to be this one though, what a tune! I must have heard it a few times at Bugged Out’s nights at The End:
jonattonyeah 1. James Zabiela
I’m actually with Smalls on this one - too busy. As with a lot (or perhaps the vast majority?) of Zabiela’s mixes it has the occasional excellent moment, but then somehow even more when it just seems to lose the plot a bit.
jonattonyeah Great work Jonatton
Mahoosive respect to Jonathan tbf. Talk about research.
Listened to a few of these that year and reading back the comments brought a lot of it back.
Mix of the year goes to Desyn for me personally
Desyn was good for a while so much so that I stayed in Heaven’s room 2 for the last three hours when Digweed was playing the main room. That and the fact the main room was too hot!
Loads of burds in the SOS room for Desyn too. More room to get your swag on too. Then heads down for Digweed a bit later.
jonattonyeah Most played song: Spektrum - Kinda New (Tiefschwarz Mix)
I cannot fully explain the ferocity with which I hate this song.
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jonattonyeah Might do 2000 next.
Spoiler alert:
If Dave Clarke’s from that year isn’t at no.1 then you’re wrong and need your head examined. Trufax.
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Just having some fun, Hugo. I’ll reply to the rest when I’m home. It’s a very long process getting through these 110/112 whatever hours of music - much of it very bad - and multiple listens for some.
I stand by the top 10 or so. After that I have to group mixes together for my own sanity. If people have issues with it well go ahead and listen to these mixes on your own then. It’s not fun! Is number 40 or whatever better than 32? Sure. Maybe. But keeping them in like-minded groupings made sense to me.
The Dave Clarke mix is just a racket. And I consider myself a fan. By 2004 mixing and technique had gotten too good to tolerate cheap crossfader tricks and drunken record smashing. He plays good tracks. But the presentation was headache-inducing. Like a two-hour root canal.
EDIT oh and I might pass on 2000 as I think I already know what’ll be #1. No fun in that.
No opinion really (other than Howells’ Madonna mashup being terrible) but it was the song of the year without any doubt. I was taken aback by the diversity of DJ’s who played it. I would guess there were months there where it was played every night out, likely multiple times
jonattonyeah heard Sander K play it at Crobar. Never went to another prog event, that I can remember.
If Sander played “The Right Time” I wouldn’t blame you for killing yourself let alone attending another prog party.