Danijay - Plug & Play

Danijay - Plug & Play

It is not really pleasent times for the italo-dance genre right now. An increasing amount of the big names in the genre such as Provenzano DJ, Prezioso, Molella, Paps’N’Skar and Gabry Ponte have chosen to convert to the most popular genre in Italy at the moment: House. The italo genre has therefore gone from being the primary type of music played in clubs to being a niche-genre in its home country. 

Fortunately there are still a couple of the big names producing the energetic italo-beats, namely Gigi D’Agostino, partly DJ Lhasa and of course Danijay.

Danijay (Daniele Zaffiri) is the man behind a long line of quality productions since his first single “Il Gioco Dell’Amore” was released in 2003. It all culminates in 2006 with the release of his first album“Dance & Breakfast” which besides new tracks also includes remixes of older singles such as “I Fiori Di Lilla”, “Luna Nera” and “Happiness”. After the release of his first album it has been surprisingly quiet regarding new releases. It is actually only “Encanto” and “Time 4 Xmas” (A Christmas song released in January – that’s what you can call Italian timing!) which have been officially released!
Single productions such as “Catch Me” and “Ride The Way” in cooperation with Provenzano DJ and single tracks such as “Egoist”, “Senza Fretta”, “You’re My Destiny” (feat STB) and “Angel” have been available on various compilations in Europe for some time now.

Danijay has definitely been productive! – Besides a lot of live shows he has been in the studio producing a lot of tracks which could be heard in his radio show on M2O.

This second album has therefore been on its way for quite some time now. It has been a weird feeling knowing that Danijay was in the studio producing without actually hearing anything concrete from him in a long time.

My worst fear for this album was whether he had chosen to follow the same road as Provenzano DJ and Gabry Ponte – which would mean House productions without much energy and a complete change in genre. Especially because he as a M2O dj is bound to play what is popular right now when playing on M2O. Fortunately this is not the case with “Plug & Play”!

Track list:
01. Ride a Girl
02. Il Gioco dell’Amore (Remix)
03. Quando Piove (Dance Mix)
04. I Fiori di Lillà (Remix)
05. Angel
06. Better With You
07. Senza Fretta (feat. Alberto Fortis)
08. You’re My Destiny (Vs. S.T.B.)
09. Catch Me (Vs. P_DJ)
10. Egoist (Vs. Overland)
11. Fly (feat. Rox & D_Angel)
12. Back 2 U
13. Until The Morning
14. Ride The Way (Vs. P_DJ)
15. The Night Before (Vs. TBM DJ)
16. Revolution
17. Happiness (Love Force Remix)
18. Experience (Vs. Iacono - cont. winner)
19. Time4Xmas (Dance Floor Mix)
20. The Sound of Love (Sander Remix)
21. Every Time (Dee Bee - Danijay rmx)
22. Consequence (Vs. Overland)
23. Oui c’est l’Amour (Vs. TBM DJ)
24. Catch Me (Vs. P_DJ - Jump Remix)
25. Ritmo d’Effetto
26. Tonight (2007 Remix)
27. Ask 4 More (Vs. Overland)
28. Right or Wrong (P_DJ - Danijay rmx)
29. Stay With Me (Vs. Iacono - c.w.)
30. Time4Xmas (Radio Edit)
31. [GOLD TRACK] Quando Piove (Pop Rock)

There is a bit of Gigi D’Agostino style about this: letting people sit and wait for a very long time and then release a massive amount of tracks. What we have here is simply ALL Danijay productions since the album “Dance & Breakfast”. As seen in the previous album also Plug & Play has a couple of new remixes of old productions such as “Il Gioco Dell’Amore”, “I Fiori Di Lillà” and of course “Happiness”.
You also notice that a lot on this album are collaborations. Even so you can still hear it is Danijay and his crew touching the buttons. Danijay’s sound has always been very characteristic energetic italodance. This has not changed. It still gets full tempo with 140 precise beats per minute, aggressive synths and uplifting refrains. The only moment you don’t feel the presence of Danijay’s sound is in the tracks produced in collaboration with Provenzano DJ (P_DJ): “Catch Me”, “Right Or Wrong” and “Ride The Way”. Provenzano’s house-like sound is much too dominating making these three too mainstream.

The rest of this album is nothing but pure energetic italodance at its best though.

I will now focus on some of the new tracks this album contains.
The track “Angel” was actually already released on the compilation “Best Italo Dance Hits” last year. It has the characteristic and highly energetic bass that only Danijay delivers, this in combination with a fine female vocal and an aggressive theme.
“Revolution” was the first track one got to hear a piece of at the announcement of this album, again full steam on the big drum with vocals by Danijay’s male and female singers. The chorus fits great and almost forces your hands in the air. 

I want, last but not least, to emphasize the third production in collaboration with the talented guys from the group Overland. The two first tracks “Consequence” and “Egoist” brilliantly combined Danijay’s energetic sound with Overland’s sense for cool synth-themes. “Ask 4 More” is no exception. Yet again the bottom is laid with an energetic and highly aggressive bass followed by a very beautiful and surprising break down to some opera which then again turns to Danijay’s singer Axel wonderful vocals with singing that only makes you smile. A sublime buildup to the chorus follows and one is on the edge to lift off when the chorus finally kicks in – simply some of the best italodance I have heard this year and without doubt the best of the new tracks on this album.

As something revolutionizing this album is not going to be released on CD but on an mp4-player which, besides the album itself, contains a lot of extra content such as videos, photos, lyrics and stuff. This has both positive and negative consequences. On the positive side it is of course nice to get all the extra content along with an okay mp4-player but on the other hand the price tag of 25€ is quite a mouthful especially as a dj because the tracks only come in mp3-quality. For 2€ extra you can get all the tracks on 2 CD’s though. 

In a time when almost all of the former big italodance producers turns their head to House and when it actually almost only is new producers who keep the genre alive, it is nice to see such a complete album from one of the artists who was present in the golden age of the genre in the middle of this decade. Danijay shows with this well produced album that his passion for dance and italodance still is the same.

I will without hesitation encourage you to go to www.danijay-store.com and throw the 25€ after this monster of an album if you liked Danijay’s previous productions.

Plug & Play di Danijay!

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