BT – A Song Across Wires (Album Review)

Posted by Middy on August 22, 2013

BT is not a producer you can put in a box and say he is trance or ambient or glitch, he is all of those things and so much more, so much more. He is one of the pillars of trance with his album “Ima” back in 1994 that helped shape the trance sound that become what so many love and yearn for today. As a classically trained musician, getting his degree from Berklee College of Music, BT when he isn’t producing some of the most critically acclaimed pieces of electronic music, he is scoring movies like Monsters Inc and Fast & Furious (just the first one). His pieces take you on musical journeys, notably his more ambient stuff, like “This Binary Universe”. He is also a great programmer and computer geek that led him to develop the stutter edit that is being used by everybody, and I mean everybody.

One cannot praise BT enough because he does it the right way, has worked incredibly hard to get where he is today, and did not get it cheap, in one case had to sell his car to finish the full project for “This Binary Universe” (2006). He is also a great guy (we got to sit down with him for an interview, coming soon) and he is brilliant.

His 9th artist album is strong departure from the rest of his material, going strictly for music that is accessible in clubs and festivals. It is interesting to hear his interpretation on modern dance music because of BT’s background in music and his strength in composition. With much of mainstream dance music becoming stale, an innovator like BT trying his hat at a more danceable sound is a relief because you know it will be something new and hopefully inspiring to others.

Beatport | iTunes

The album includes some previously released tracks like “Tomohawk”, which blew the people’s minds across all spectrums of dance music because it was BT stepping outside of his niche and bringing his dynamic, complex sound to electro and upbeat trance in a way that people were not expecting. Chart topper and hit single “Must Be The Love” featuring Russian phenom Arty and noted songstress, Nadia Ali, helps round out the album, while his ambient, trance masterpiece “Skylarking” introduces the album with a soothing opening to ease you into what will you experience next.

The album shifts sounds and styles quite dramatically, ranging from melodic, glitchy dubstep with Fractal, who’s talent BT has hailed, to slowed down 128-132 melodic trance tracks with guys like tyDi and Tritonal. The album launches right into these dubstep tracks, slapping you right in the face after the smooth beauty of “Skylarking. The rest of the album of the album are his 128-132 bpm progressive and trance tunes, broken up by the 4th single from the album, “Surrounded”. Vocals, as they usually are for his dance albums, are key with trance mainstays like Emma Hewitt, JES and Tania Zygar all gracing the album with their golden pipes.

It may appear somewhat odd that BT is making an album like this after all of these years, but he has never been really inspired by the music around him. With the proliferation of so many genres and new producers making great stuff nowadays, he is finally looking outside of his bubble and wants to get a grasp of what is going on in the dance music community and try and apply his immense capacity as a programmer, composer and producer to what he has been hearing over the past 3 or 4 years.

Will all of these tracks go on the anthology BT greatest hits? That is still to be determined, but as a whole body of work, this is about as complete a work there has been released this year in terms of composition, sound and production. It goes without saying that is incredibly well produced, but the glitchy effects and programing throughout the album, make these cuts one step ahead of his competitors.

Tags: album, artist, Arty, Berklee College, BT, dubstep, glitch, melodic, music, niche, producer, sound, today, work