Oldie But Goodie: Random Album Title

Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you may have noticed that deadmau5 released his sixth studio album last October > album title goes here <. Love it or hate it, it’s hard to deny the mau5’s influence on America’s new love for EDM. Don’t kid yourself that EDM is as commonplace as pop music in the United States (Justin Bieber’s Believe and Mumford & Son’s Babel hold top spots for 2012 album sales), but it’s seemingly more–dare I say it–’mainstream’ now than ever before and acts like deadmau5 are at the forefront of that mainstream-ness.

This past year got me thinking. Pretty much everyone I know in the ‘scene’ (not a fan of this word, just an easy way to sum up this group) including DJs, promoters, die-hard fans, and people older than myself, is more or less apathetic to the DJ superstar elites, and instead more interested in the niches of EDM. While there are some redeeming tracks on Album–like ‘Closer’, a great play on the chords from the Close Encounters Of The Third Kind theme–the album as a whole doesn’t really resonate with me as well as some of deadmau5’s older work, namely Random Album Title, which led me to write this column.

deadmau5 – Faxing Berlin

Random will always be the quintessential deadmau5 album to me. With the exception of “I Remember” which to me largely has a Kaskade sound, the album is filled with true-to-its-roots electro and progressive house goodness. Tracks like “Faxing Berlin”, “Arguru”, and “Not Exactly” are truly my favorite mau5 tracks, and admittedly, I couldn’t even name them without iTunes open. Random is mixed and the whole thing is a journey. At least a handful of times a month, I’ll play it over and over again nodding my head without even realizing it. The intensity will rise and subside through changes in dynamics, chords, and instrumentation. Most of the tracks don’t even have vocals!

With how quickly dance music seems to move from one hot track to the next, it’s sometimes feels good to listen to the albums that were favorites not very long ago. Random is exactly one of those titles. It’s an album that I remember listening to when I first discovered deadmau5 and was still getting my feet wet with dance music. Just think, back then, mau5 heads were almost exclusively red and certainly weren’t covered in LED. Nonetheless, it’s an album that I still listen to from start to finish in order to take in the full arc.

Oldie But Goodie will be a recurring column featuring EDM albums from yesteryear. Discuss your favorite albums and leave suggestions for future columns in the comments below.