Search - Various Artists :: Ultra Trance 04

A Much-Needed Return to Form.

The Groove | Boston, MA | 09/18/2004

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Following the disappointing volumes 2 and 3, Ultra Records gets its groove back on "Ultra Trance 4," a surprisingly consistent collection of 2 discs featuring the latest trance anthems. The more mainstream first disc has readily familiar names and titles, ranging from Paul Van Dyk's "Connected," Jordan James souped up cover of the Bon Jovi hit "Livin' on a Prayer," Plumment's cover of the Sade tune "Cherish the Day," and 4 Strings' explosive "Turn it Around." The mood gets a bit darker on the second disc, where we get more instrumental tracks and fewer vocals. Key selections are the bouncy "White Room," Jas Van Houten's energetic "Loco Love," and "Age of Love." Just when I thought it was safe to write off this series, Ultra Records comes back strong with two winning CDs on "Ultra Trance 4" that should find a welcome home in most dance collections. It's a safe bet that they'll be getting some rotation in my stereo for a while."

The best Ultra _______ ever!

Doctor Trance | MA, United States | 10/23/2004

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I've never purchased an Ultra anything CD, partly because of the commercial feel of them, with many current trance anthems thrown in with junk fillers. They don't even tell you who mixed them on the CD notes. I've heard them as friends of mine had them, but nothing ever motivated me to purchase one. I finally broke down and bought Ultra Trance: 4 (which Amazon incorrectly lists as Ultra Trance 04 -- there is no zero in front of the four anywhere on the CD packaging).



I was pleasantly surprised to find lots of great trance, with some commercial bangers in there with great, not so easy to find, hard Euro trance. Disc 1 is your mainstream, commercial trance, with some of the past years dance floor and dance radio smashes, including tracks by Plummet, Angel City, Paul Van Dyk, Motorcycle, and Ferry Corsten. Disc 2 brings in some lesser known tracks which were not found on many other US trance cd's like lots of tracks on Disc 1 are. I have a lot of them already from getting some great import CD's, but it's nice to have them all here on a US release.



Disc 1 does have some flubs, with the awful O-Zone track, a bad Bon Jovi remake, and my least favorite 4 strings release to date, Turn it Around. The only two things I can fault on Disc 2 is that Obsession by Tiesto is getting on in age now, and they could have included a more current track of his, or of somebody else; and Age of Love has had too many remixes lately, and after hearing Tony De Vit's previously unavailable remix of it, on his Are You All Ready compilation CD released last year, all other Age of Love remixes pale in comparison.



With only 12 tracks per disc, you are getting a lot of longer mixes, however they do chop a few songs up, most notably, arguably the best track on Disc 2, I Found You by Interstate, only gets a measly 3 minutes plus.



One other note, I am not sure if most people know, but Jes is on here 3 times! She is the singer from Motorcycle, and she also sings Deepsky's Talk Like a Stranger, and D:Fuse's Living the Dream. I believe these 3 tracks and her other song with D: Fuse Everything With You, are her only 4 tracks to date, but I can't wait for more."

Sweet trance here!

The Spastic Fantastic Mighty House | Waltham, Massachusetts, United States, Planet Eart | 10/07/2004

(5 out of 5 stars)

"What can I say? Volume four of the Ultra Trance series is just great! Here on a two disc set, this is some excellent trance, just like in the club. Disc one has songs like "This Is My DJ" by Hard In Tango. There's an accordion in this song which I think is cute. It's one of my favorites on disc one. There's also Ferry Corsten's "It's Time." I think I remember in an interview with Ferry that the song was meant to sound like something from the 80s, and it pretty much does! I like the beats in this song. Another song on here is "Dragostea Din Tei" by O-Zone. Incase you're wondering what language this song is sung in, it's actually sung in Romanian. I was wondering myself what language it was in. I looked it up on the internet and found out it was in Romanian. "Dragostea Din Tei" means "Love from the linden trees." Plus, any true trance person should know the anthem "As The Rush Comes" by Motorcycle (Don't tell me you don't know the song if you're a true trance fan!). The version of "ATRC" on here is the Armin van Buuren Universal Religion Remix. It's still a good version. Van Buuren's excellent. Another song on disc one is "It's Gonna Get You" by Double Nation. This song may be a rip-off of Bizarre Inc's "I'm Gonna Get You," but I still like this for some reason. I don't know why. On disc one, here's also Paul van Dyk's "Connected," "Livin' On A Prayer" by Jordan James, Angel City's "Touch Me," Andain's "Beautiful Things" (You gotta dig that guitar), Above & Beyond's "No One On Earth," and more. Disc two includes songs like Marco V's Remix of Age Of Love's "Age Of Love." The original version of "Age Of Love" was released waaaaaaay back in 1990 (Correct me if I'm wrong, but it may be one of the first trance anthems ever!). The original version's percussion wasn't as loud or hard back then, but still went in the traditional 140 BPM speed. This new version's still okay. I also liked Armin van Buuren's "Blue Fear 2004." This is my favorite song on the whole album. "BF2K4" is also one of the most freakiest songs on the album with its bass and haunting synthesizers. This is the kind of song I would play on Halloween. For some reason, Jas Van Houten's "Loco Love" keeps me awake and working. It's really moving! Also on disc two, Tiesto's "Obsession," Tiesto's remix of "Rain Down On Me" by Kane, White Room's "White Room," (Wow, another song named after the artist(s)) D:Fuse's "Living The Dream," "Talk Like A Stranger" by Deepsky, and more. What an awesome album. To me, it's just like getting your hands on the Stanley Cup. That's how satisfied I am about buying this."