Track Listing
Closed Eyes In A Dust Storm (Coss & Iorie Black Sand Mix)
To Be The Air (Rapossa Remix)
Traversing The Endless Road (Luca Bacchetti Endless Remix)
One That Shows The Way (Unders Remix)
Dreams Within A Dream (Nhii Remix)
Realms Of Splendor (Roderic Remix)
To Be The Air (Forever & Ever Remix)
Traversing The Endless Road (Alvaro Suarez Remix)
Dreams Within a Dream (Derun Remix)
At Last, Our Refuge (The Invisible People Remix)
Traversing the Endless Road (BOSA Remix)
Back for a second volume and 11 more down-tempo tracks to enjoy, Desert Dwellers return for a heady, electronica-infused trip into the remixed world of dance music. Featuring a collection of familiar songs that make a re-appearance from the first volume, Breath Re-Imagined continues to re-imagine these tracks in interesting and tightly mixed compositions.
This concerted effort to remix these familiar tracks certainly shows off the production prowess of the various different artists but also feels like a volume that may have benefited from a couple of new compositions altogether. That’s not to say what’s here is disappointing but the faults with the first volume also show up here too.
Having said that though, Breath Re-Imagined Vol. 2 does have a distinct flavour to it that leans much heavier into progressive and deep house vibes. This helps set it apart from the first volume while also, interestingly, make it more of a genre piece. While it never quite embraces these deep house echoes fully, some of these remixes do come close – especially the Unders remix of “One That Shows The Way.”
This same trend can be found in Roderick’s remix of “Realms Of Splendor” too, although the added distortion across the synth helps to move it into electronica territory instead.
Much like I mentioned during the review of Volume 1, the wonderful strums of the Egyptian Oud helps give this album a distinct Middle Eastern flavour. The best track including this happens to arrive very late in the game. Given how many different remixes of “Dreams Within A Dream” we’ve received across these two volumes, Derun’s remix is arguably the strongest.
Clocking in at an eye-opening 10 minutes and 34 seconds, the entire track builds up slowly before crescendoing into a great solo using that aforementioned Egyptian Oud that makes it my stand-out track on the album.
Despite some good remixes and a couple of nicely reworked compositions, Volume 2 struggles to hit the same highs as January’s effort. With no new tracks and very familiar, distinct compositions being drawn on, Breath Re-Imagined Vol. 2 feels like a well-worn pair of jeans that slip back on effortlessly. On the one hand, this is great and makes it easy to get into, but it also comes with all the same baggage and kinks from before.
Hopefully when Desert Dwellers release Volume 3 we’ll get some new material to chew through. In the meantime, Volume 2 serves up an altogether familiar collection of songs that are worth a listen but also feels somewhat overshadowed by what we received earlier this year.
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Verdict - 6/10
6/10