Richard Durand – Wide Awake
Pin ItFeaturing the chart-busting singles "Tiger’s Apology" & "Dry Land" and vocal collaborations with luminaries like JES & Christian Burns, Richard Durand is ready to un-cage his thrilling new album… ‘Wide Awake’
Having successfully rebooted ‘In Search Of Sunrise‘ into an IDMA-nominated compilation, the latter half of 2010 saw Richard Durand return to the studio. Over six months he recorded the follow-up to his freshman album, ‘Always The Sun‘. Now he’s ready to put the year into overdrive with his much anticipated second long-player…
With the album giving him an ideal platform with which to expand his musical scope, the Dutchman has housed 17 whip-sharp, cross-party electronic dance tracks on ‘Wide Awake‘… Following its completion, Richard commented: "when I started this album, I knew that it wouldn’t be ‘Always The Sun Pt. II’ – I didn’t feel there’d be any sense in covering exactly the same ground again. I wanted each successive track I produced to have a different feel and tone than the last. This method has led to a long-player I’m extremely happy and proud of. Now, more than anything, I’m looking forward to taking the music into the clubs and seeing the crowd’s reactions to it!"
From the very first key-strike of its dazzling curtain raiser "Burning Piano" through to the gauzy melodics of "Clear Blue Sky" and the hookily vocalled title track "Wide Awake", the album builds a large precedent. Diversifying out into other spheres, it serves buzzing distortion-driven house fare like "Robotic" and high-octane, electro-fused numbers like "Disturbed" and "Real Deal" just as fast.
Those on the look out for high-impact tech-trance-minded Durand floor-thrillers won’t need to hunt far either. "Airwell", "Open Range", "Incredible Music", "Tiger’s Apology" and "Crystal" (with protégée Alex O’Rion) all open the throttle and set their sights collectively on the heart of the floor…
For its vocal numbers, Richard has gathered together some of very special singing/song-writing talent. Christian Burns (who sung on Tiësto’s "Alone In The Dark"), and JES add mood and moment to "Night & Day" and "N.Y.C." respectively, while Kash’s atypical rapid-fire lyrics and staccato vocals light "Explode’s" touch-paper.
From the sharp end of trance synthery, thru to swirling progressive atmospherics, to the speaker-quaking bass-rock of electro… and all points in between, Durand’s ‘Wide Awake‘ posts a new apex in his career.
