The new chapter of the king of trance, announced for a month, will be out everywhere on January 12th
The wave of new music that Armin van Buuren released in the hard period of the pandemic in the following two years led the king of Dutch trance to publish, just over a year ago, in 2022, a trilogy of albums, Feel Again: how the name suggests, the album wanted to bring (and it succeeded very well) all the passion and energy of music that for too long we have not been able to experience with festivals and live events.
Feel Again was the true follow up to the previous Balance full-length (2019): a collection of all the musical genius of the Leiden DJ and producer, with tracks ranged from progressive to house music, to pop-dance music up to, obviously, trance:
The 2023 that just ended was the year of Reflexion for A State Of Trance and undoubtedly new symphonies have influenced, but without distorting the foundations of the project, the music of the radioshow and of Armin van Buuren carrer, gathering the new trends of trance music oriented towards a return of faster rhythms and closer to techno music.
Breathe In, out tomorrow, January 11, which represents Armin’s ninth studio album, after 76 (2003), Shivers (2005), Imagine (2008), Mirage (2010), Intense (2013), Embrace (2015), Balance (2019) and Feel Again (2022) it’s a shorter project than the previous two albums but that fully represents the new trends that revolve around trance music, with fast and fun sounds, without missing that dance touch that has characterized many of the Dutch dj’s productions for a few years.
In recent weeks Armin van Buuren has shared some clips in which he explained how some of the twelve tracks on the album were born, most of which have already been released in recent months and have already became incredible successes: as Destination with Ferry Corsten, Ruben de Ronde and Rank 1, or rather the anthem for ASOT 2024 and elected Tune Of The Year 2023 three weeks ago and the incredible Space Case, a powerful melody that recalls the great hard trance classics of the beginning 00s.
In the wake of the high bpm, in Breathe In we find a track released last April: the successful collaboration with Vini Vici since 2016 has given rise to some hits that have become iconic in the trance scene: the last of these, When We Come Alive (feat. ALBA), gives the album that psy-trance touch.
Two vocal tracks, characterized by very fast rhythms and which light up the dancefloor: God Is In The Soundwaves (vs. Xoro and Yola Recoba) and Lose This Feeling: both tracks wink at 90s club music, giving us two nostalgic rhythms impossible to forget.
A more progressive-house sound pushed one of Armin’s biggest hits of last year and which is also part of the new album: the beautiful Motive, of which we can’t bother mentioning the insane remix of 7 Skies, widely played in many DJ sets in recent months.
Love Is A Drug (feat. Anne Gudrun) is instead the classic progressive-trance bomb that only Armin van Buuren can give us: one of the strongest trance track of 2023, with that electro-dance touch which rides the intense vocal part, in a devastating beat.
Another vocal track that impressed us a lot in 2023 and featured in Breathe In was Fire With Fire (with HRRTZ); opening track of the iconic compilation A State Of Trance 2023, this track captures for the union between the harmonious voice of Julia Church and the captivating progressive beat.
Armin van Buuren has often recalled how techno music was an important part of his career as an artist and in fact techno sound is the basis of the collaboration with Just_Us: Make It Count is certainly the most “explosive” track of the entire album, here Armin doesn’t put any kind of brake on his ancestral love for this genre: it’s a bomb !
Breathe In opens with a strong collaboration between Armin and the English trio Goodboys: “Forever (Stay Like This)” was written during one of the first event after the pandemic in 2021 and tells the emotion to see again many happy people to be back on the dancefloor; the track takes a sample of the famous 1990 classic Guru Josh – Infinity.
The entire album will be available on January 12th but in preview tomorrow at 8 pm during episode 1155 of A State Of Trance radioshow and we will therefore be able to listen to also the only two tracks still unreleased; the complete tracklist:
1. Forever (Stay Like This) (with Goodboys)
2. God Is In The Soundwaves (with Xoro and Yola Recoba)
3. Love Is A Drug (with Anne Gudrun)
4. Lose This Feeling
5. Motive
6. Destination (A State Of Trance 2024 Anthem) (with Ferry Corsten, Rank 1 and Ruben de Ronde)
7. Inevitable (with GREYLEE)
8. Fire With Fire (with HRRTZ and Julia Church)
9. When We Come Alive (with Vini Vici and ALBA)
10. Bed Of Rain (with Mila Josef)
11. Make It Count (with Just_Us)
12. Space Case