Stare into Dreamtrak’s “Do Re Mi” video until the slipping neon graphics have you cross-eyed.
Do you remember the kinda awful graphics Windows XP had available as screensavers, where laser-like lines would morph into abstract shapes, writhing around the screen manically? Dreamtrak, otherwise known as East London’s Oli Horton, has gone down that fondly familiar path for his video to accompany, “Do Re Mi”, only he’s upped the trippy ante tenfold. Made with old video synthesis kit, it starts off like a Ceefax page having a meltdown and things only get weirder. Neon colours, flying graphics and outsized 4:3 view settings, don’t watch if you’re feeling a little off.
Taken from his self-titled debut EP, released on Double Denim last week, the glorious electronic mess that is “Do Re Mi” sits happily alongside the rather more melodic, “The Tide”, pulsing “Bad Thoughts”, groove-laden “Control 2.” and “Contemporary”, which sounds like a much cooler rework of that Bodyrox “Yeah Yeah” tune from way back (banger, right?).
Created on a eBay bought toy keyboard – the kind that comes with barking dog effects as standard – Dreamtrax decided to make some half-speed trance. “I just thought that would be an interesting thing but I couldn’t find any already in existence,” Horton explains, “although I definitely was influenced by the more recent Alan Braxe stuff, and also by Blanck Mass, I wanted it to be kinda heavy and a bit unsettling whilst also being euphoric. “Do Re Mi” is actually at 130bpm so it should mix into a trance set pretty well.