joker jam - traffic (sunset mix)

for some reason joker jam's "traffic" started playing in my head earlier today when i was listening to radio and heard some awful song, which i know of but will not name. i was near a mall of some sorts and as i was leaving the place, the power went out and it was dark. outside it's pissing down snow like it should as i'm living in a country where you have winters as in the classic description of the season. the reason i found it weird that melody of "traffic" came into my head was because it's such a summery track and my surroundings were nothing but that.

anyhow when i first heard the song in '04 it was through van bellen's remix and that was because i was heavily into his productions at the time. he knew how to make punchy progressive house and trance and on this one it leaned towards the housier. he took use of the atmosphere and the latent summery feel in the track and refitted the groove of the original and made a great piece of music. a few months after i heard it i was in a stockholm recordstore, that my mate worked in at the time, and saw it there when i was there to pick up a few other records*.

when i listened to the record i discovered the original as well and it was a really good track but i was more intrigued that there was a fourteen minute version on the flip. it was called the "sunset mix" and it became a favourite, even more than the van bellen remix. truth be told that i had seen the record prior on discogs and thought that it was an ambient or downtempo mix as it was called the "sunset mix".

never the less it's nothing of the sorts and it's a trancier and atmospheric version of the original. the pads of the original are boosted in signifance and the groove is more driving. then there is the inclusion of all the trippy sounds that van bellen also took advantage of in his remix and the acid line that is introduced. just that alone is part of why i love it but it isn't the full story. holters goes all out with this version and in the end it something that sounds like a crossbreed between etnoscope and chicane, in the all the right ways.

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