Deadmau5 - At Play Vol.2 [Album]

Play Records

Play Records have followed up the widely respected and praised ‘At Play’ Deadmau5 release with the second edition. Drawing reference to press materials in order to give a further insight; ‘Included in the package are tracks by Juno award winning Billy Newton-Davis with the ‘All U Ever Want’ mix, ‘R My Dreams’, and dance floor diva Mellefresh with her Billboard Top 10 chart smasher ‘Attention Whore’. I’m not wholly familiar with the two artists mentioned, but given the track record of Deadmau5 and his team, I am confident they are worthy to feature on this CD.

For those of you who are lesser informed, Deadmau5 arrived on the scene in 2006 and whose ‘real’ name is Joel Zimmerman. Dubbed as featuring ’10 full length DJ friendly tracks’, I’m ever hopeful that this phrasing is accurate to the release.

Straight off the bat, It’s safe to say the two aforementioned guest musicians offer the most memorable and interesting offerings on the album. They present a more accessible range of songs, including vocals for a start, which for a non-follower of previous work and makes the overall sound far more manageable. The tracks where Deadmau5 leads solely, are perhaps more perfectly suited as a background arrangement for any new artists hoping to dabble with vocal and band arrangements. On a personal level, I found nothing particularly exciting about these efforts, as they tended to drift from one to another without any real individuality. There may be other hardcore fans of Deadmau5 work who disagree and maybe I’ve missed a trick with this, but I wasn’t convinced by what I heard. The song ‘Sex Slave’ which is a collaboration between Mellefresh and Deadmau5 led to me checking my phone numerous times, as it seem to feature a few distant yet memorable Nokia ringtones.

The notable songs here are ‘Outta My Life’ and ‘Attention Whore’ which really do provide the only unique audible experiences over the whole ten tracks. They encapsulate some great beats with well chosen vocals that add a certain quality. Other than that, I wouldn’t be looking to this CD for any new musical directions or stunning brainwaves as they are too hard to find, if they are featured at all.

"At Play Vol.2" is good for a DJ but I’m not entirely convinced that a conventional listener is going to get a huge amount out of this. Like I said, I'm sure many will disagree, but for me it's nothing special.

TRACKLISTING:

1. Billy Newton-Davis Vs deadmau5 - Outta my Life (Touch mix)
2. Mellefresh Vs deadmau5 - Attention Whore
3. deadmau5 - Mr G
4. deadmau5 - Reduction
5. BSOD - This is Also the Hook
6. deadmau5 - Orca
7. deadmau5 - Tau V2
8. Mellefresh Vs deadmau5 - Sex Slave
9. deadmau5 - This Noise
10. Billy Newton-Davis Vs deadmau5 - R My Dreams[/font]