The music technology practitioner's bible, EQ, claims that everything Paul van Dyk touches turns to gold and it is easy to understand this when you consider his achievements so far.

Here is a highly photogenic producer-DJ at the cutting edge of technology, whose production techniques demand the respect of record producers of whichever genre, who is paid kings' ransoms to play at Ibiza's top clubs, who gave Saint Etienne their first top 10 single success earlier this year with Tell Me Why (The Riddle) (track 6 on this album, mixed with the preceding and proceeding tracks) and whose album Out There And Back, is set to be one of this year's seminal dance albums.

van Dyk's live sets are renowned too - his trademark is being able to play exactly what people want to hear when they want to hear it, controlling their mood perfectly. This is what the album achieves too, with it's relatively sedate opener 'Vega', which brings you away from whichever other music you might still be humming and gently suggests that you take notice. The pace quickens until we discover that groove so essential for a good club night and it is a groove van Dyk effortlessly holds throughout the remainder of the album.

You don't have to go to Ibiza to listen to this man of course, but a hunch tells me that, like me, when you hear this album you will be sorely tempted to go book your flights immediately.

Share ('')

end of year feature musicOMH's 50 Best Albums Of 2009 From the nearly 700 albums we reviewed this year, which did our writers love the most? Introduction 50-41 | 40-31 | 30-21 20-11 | 10-4 | 1-3