Tiësto: In Search of Sunrise 6 – Ibiza

Too often, trance, dance, and house music can devolve into an overextended series of beeps and beats, trailing off into a gratuitous techno maturbatory mix. While it’s easy to slip over the into trance’s bad part of town, Tiësto patrols the borders of the genre’s good taste. The globe-trotting Dutch DJ bangs out another installment in his In Search of Sunrise series, already in its sixth leg of the journey. This time around, he’s off to the international mecca of partying, Ibiza off the coast of Spain and the summer hot spot for club-hopping tourists. Appropriately enough, the island’s name is derived from the Egyptian god of dance and merriment. Like the last few installments of Tiësto’s In Search of Sunrise collection, Ibiza is a well-packed dual disc set, giving trance-aholics more bang for their buck. Two discs, however, is a drop in the bucket for this guy, known for his contagious energy and marathon sets, sometimes exceeding over five hours. Having previously worked his magic on thematic compilations for Los Angeles, Miami, and Panama, Tiësto once again captures the essence of his locale of choice. This time around, Tiësto’s remixes give the feel of a very modern dance party being held on an ancient beach. Each song flows into the next without a sharp delineation to break the mood. Tiësto seems to have his act down pat, picking just the right songs to calm things down and then bring the mood back up again with a mix between beat-heavy dance tracks to mellow tunes perfect for zoning out and thinking about nothing on a beach, allowing your thoughts to drift from deeply personal philosophical treatises or wondering what your next drink will be before trotting to the dance floor. Even if you’re not a trance person, it’s hard to deny Tiësto’s skill at hearing the voice of a geographical area and interpreting its spirit into sound into a universal language.