Category: Reviews

REVIEW: Emma Hewitt – ‘Burn the Sky Down’

By: Ben Norman

Trance, like all of the popular and overpopulated genres of the world, is a fickle lover. As a singer at the height of your career, your voice caresses the minds of millions of listeners through collaborations with producers on countless tracks. At the lowest point, you are forgotten, another echoed voice over a trance beat. But Aussie Emma Hewitt is far from the lowest point in her career, and rather than aiming for the heights, she is aiming to be the best possible artist she can be, trance singer or other. And if her debut single as a solo artist is any indication, Emma Hewitt’s presence will be a given.
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CD REVIEW: Iiris – ‘The Magic Gift Box’

By: Ben Norman

In music, when it comes to a new artist, we always dissect them by who they sound like. We say stuff like, “If Barbra Streisand and David Bowie had a child raised by Slash, that’s what this would sound like,” and people nod and go ‘hmm,’ and the artist gets shoved into a specific categorization despite the fact that there’s very little in common between Stresand, Bowie, or Slash. And so, in my opinion, it’s a disservice to a new artist to categorize them so, and yet? it’s almost as if no one can relate to a new artist unless they can familiarize themselves by that association.
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REVIEW: Will Holland – ‘Digitally Enhanced Volume 5’

As a huge fan of trance and progressive house music, I have to admit that it is a joy when I come across a new source of music that had somehow escaped my notice before. Of course with that joy also comes a bit of shame knowing that somehow the?Digitally Enhanced?compilation series had somehow escaped my radar over the years. Don?t get me wrong, I have heard of Enhanced Recordings and the progress that Will Holland has made in providing some of the most consistent trance around, but for some reason his compilation series had been an enigma to me. Holland’s endeavors have not gone unnoticed, though, by many and over the past few years, fans of trance have been delighted with each release in the?Digitally Enhanced?compilations series. Fortunately for trance fans, the fifth volume of this series is now being released containing two discs of exclusive, unreleased material filled with progressive-minded and high-energy trance.

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