EnTranced

Victor Dinaire (host of FUTURE PROGRESSION)

Sometimes you just have to forget your preconceived notions of what you like and/or don't like and flush them down the toilet. Admit to yourself that tastes change with age and experience. It's that way with food (how I used to hate onions and green peppers, but they sure taste good to me in a Philly Steak submarine sandwich these days). It's that way with television shows (I can hardly believe that I actually watched Family Ties on a weekly basis and it took me until NYPD Blue's run was nearly finished before I finally caught on to the genius of that great show). It's that way with reading (I never thought I'd ever WANT to make it through Tolstoy's War And Peace, but last year after I plodded through the lengthy tome I was surprised at how much I enjoyed it).
So it only stands to reason that it's the same with music. Just because I never gave trance the time of day and dismissed it outright because I found the pulsating, persistant metronomical bottom-end beat to be more than I was willing to subject myself to at the time...well, that didn't mean I'd never come to a point in my musical evolution where I might actually enjoy it.
Tuesday night wanting to try something different from my usual fare, I threw caution to the wind, tuned into XM Radio's "The System", put on the headphones and caught DJ Victor Dinaire's program, FUTURE PROGRESSION. I had finally caught on to the idea that the repetitive beat, in trance music, is the equivalent of the watch a hypnotist swings in front of your face and tells you to stare at, then lulls you into the hypnotic state where the mind is most vulnerable to suggestion. The constant sequenced beat, I deduced, was meant to serve as a sort of grounding mechanism to keep me from getting swept away by the layers upon layers of swirling sound that bloomed, blossomed and faded around it's thud. In a way, I was reminded of Autechre and the IDM/Glitch that I already champion, in that there's so much going on you may not notice something that's been happening for several seconds until it has moved to the forefront of the mix, catches your attention and plays out, letting you discover something else that you may have missed when it creeped into the sonic jungle, your mind being occupied by the last melody/rythmic construction and, of course, that ear-drum pounding thump.
Long story short, I found myself quite immersed in the seamless flow of Dinaire's jockeying. Having never really listened to trance all that much in the past, I can say that he is "the best I've ever heard"...which means absolutely NOTHING since I can't compare his technique to anyone else's. I could not for the life of me throw out an opinion on how his mixing compares to that of other trance giants like Paul Oakenfold and John Digweed.
Now that Dinaire has eased me into an appreciation of trance music (and look ma! No drugs!), I'll have to seek out some tracks by Oakenfold, who was always very popular at the CD store I used to work at. I'll also pull out that BT CD I never really listened to and give it another whirl.
No, I have no idea where Victor Dinaire rates on the chart of Who's Who In Trance, but I don't really care. I enjoy his work, and it opened my ears to a whole new world of sound. I'll be listening to FUTURE PROGRESSION whenever I can.