This is the first fully digital artist album to appear on the highly acclaimed JOOF label. UK DJ and producer Steve Birch has provided us with ten trancy tracks, so let's find out what exactly we're dealing with here...

After the huge succes of Steve's 'Spaced Out / Lost Forever' EP and his spot-on remix for Fleming & Lawrence's 'Attention', it is now time for the first full artist album under his own name. It's been in the works since July 2004 and includes ten trancers in Steve's own distinctive sound.
Support is coming from the likes of Ferry Corsten, Woody van Eyden and Alex M.O.R.P.H.

'Hypnotica' is the track that starts things off on this album. Featuring smooth, straightforward trancy soundscapes, a not too shabby percussion and a wickedly building array of synths, it smoothly evolves into a somewhat dreamy yet lush experience with its big euphoric breakdown, which makes place for some of the synthy goodness from the build afterwards. It's very noticeable that Steve's also into the deeper sides of trance because of an interesting use of structures and moody melodies. 'Twisted Happiness' comes with a quite similar percussion, but this time it's being driven onwards by a more funky bassline, crispy effects and an overall more eerie atmosphere. Tiny, very subtle pieces of melody emerge every now and then, disappearing and reappearing to make place for interludes containing weird yet entertaining sounds. This is definitely a bit of a building track, suiting the album's first few compositions very nicely.

With 'Moondance', things start to darken up a bit. A rather standard percussion and a slick grinding bassline are the main foundations here, with their guides being sets of sweeping FX and a simple yet superbly effective, constantly growing riff. It filters in and out of the track all the time, slowly becoming a more full-featured riff with its dark yet high pitched feel. While the track itself is not bad at all, I kind of think that it takes a bit too long to be enjoyed optimally the whole time.
Luckily, we get treated with the superb 'Groove Control' after this. This is one hell of an adorable track with that distinct Steve Birch percussion, a good b-line and a very well thought out use of building synth melodies. Beautiful breaks with this kind of deep, emotive sound serve as preludes to smooth kick-ins of both the percs and bassline backed by a repeating melody, but things really start off at around the five minute mark with a devastating, emotionally charged super-break. This will bring shivers down your spine instantly, and the riff just completes the whole picture perfectly fitting into the rest of the track. Highlight alert!

'Midnight Wonder' gets things going immediately with its fast paced structure and swirly, sweeping background melodies. It torpedes onwards like a high speed train during the build, keeping everything at a not too complicated level by using up not too many elements. Spacy effects and a very addictive lil' synth take on a leading role, with the first one building itself out to its maximum level throughout the rest of the track. Structure-wise, this one could be compared with 'Moondance'. Also, the same argument I gave there can be applied here: the idea is great, but it just takes a tad too long!
Mean, raw soundscapes and NASA-like vocal snips are what define 'Weird World' at first sight. It's main characteristics are a set of introductory melodies during the build, concluding in a more or less standard first part of the track. The breakdown is of another caliber though; everything comes to a complete halt to make place for a really smooth, relaxing amount of guitar-like chords playing a neat lil' melody, subtly being accompanied by the vocal snippets. A stabbing main riff takes care of a great amount of agility to be inserted here, enabling the tune to become a full featured dancefloor track. With the melody morphing and changing here as well, this is a track that doesn't really impress during its first half, but makes up for that in a great way in the second part!

'Dreamstate' encapsulates a samey percussion and bassline as we've heard earlier on the album, but defines itself using a good bunch of distorted, industrial sounding effects and some soaring backing synths. A euphoric element is being added by bringing in a very elevating high melody on top of everything, but it can't really succeed in making the track stand out. Nothing too special!
On the other hand, 'Crying Angel' does know how to work its way up to your head with its rougher, more techy approached percussion combined with a bassline that instantly reminded me of a track by Outback. Subtle mini-breaks take care of the introduction of a huge array of synth early on in the tune, with the techy element remaining noticeable by the use of that good bassline. But the best thing is the totally unexpected piano break: it plays its own version of one of the riffs from earlier on in the track, then for everything to burst loose again with all the former elements thrown together. Quality!

'Love Juice' is another pure uplifter with a more thumpy bassdrum and a deep yet not too special bassline boiling behind the rest of the track's structure. Steve has once again made this a track that builds itself up from the beginning to the end. Breaks including slick sounds and an array of nice melodies are being followed up by energetic kick-ins of the percussion and bassline, with the biggest climatic part of the track appearing just two minutes before the end of this 9-minute ride. Wicked vocal chants and hugely euphoric riffs have been combined here to great effect, resulting in a very nice one-to-last track!
Steve's own remix of his track 'Inside The Future' closes off this almost 80 minutes taking journey. It features a rapid vibe, vastly uplifting atmosphere and beepy, inventive synthwork. An infectious stabbing melody takes on a leading role, returning every once in a while to set up the right vibe for the cool beepy melodies and other elements. Not the best track on the album but certainly worth a good amount of listens!

'Aquarius' is out now and can be bought on Audiojelly, iTunes, Beatport, Trackitdown etc.

Conclusion:
Steve Birch has definitely succeeded in showing what style has being doing it for him lately. The ten tracks on this album all combine well-defined melodies with a very typical, thin, yet well working percussion. My personal favourites are the wonderful big-breakdown 'Groove Control', 'Weird World', 'Crying Angel' and 'Love Juice'.
In May, Steve will release another album under his Lucid Dreamer guise. It will feature more psy-influenced trance, so keep your ears peeled!