Written by: Jason Haynes
When it comes to trance, there is no bigger name in the field than Armin van Buuren who has established himself as the top representative of the genre. Not only has he been voted the number one DJ in the world for the past few years, but he has also maintained a massive presence in the EDM community with his highly popular State of Trance radio series and live shows worldwide. I was definitely curious, though, to see what direction Armin would take with his fifth studio album, considering his last release, Mirage, was something of a disappointment with its more commercialized sound. One had to wonder if Armin was going to follow the path of Tiesto and create more radio-friendly music, which would feel like a sellout to his true fans. Intense finds the highly acclaimed DJ trying to find his inner voice and moving forward and while the new release is an improvement over Mirage, fans are still left however with an enigma that never truly captures the vision and sound that originally catapulted Armin to fame.
