The Vitals:

Label: Nettwerk
Genre: Progressive House
Number of Tracks: 12
How to Obtain: www.beatport.com and most retail stores

Factor Scores:

Production Quality: 9.5
Programming and Arrangement: 8.5
Entertainment Quality: 9.0
Total: 9.0 – Tasty & Fresh

Dave's Take:

Andy Hunter⁰ is back, and this is probably the highest score I've given on any review here. Andy deserves it. If you'll allow me to editorialize for a moment, Andy's solo career has been nothing but stellar as far as licensing has been concerned, but creatively, I felt it was lacking. With his first two solo releases–Exodus and Life–Andy worked closely with a Christian label and producer Tedd T. Prior to his solo work, he was best known for his work as one third of the Drum and Bass outfit Trip and for his work on parts of the second Hydro album Aborigination.

So, why am I going here? Well, it's because with this album, Andy has teamed up with the guru who helped make both of those other release gel: Robbie Bronnimann of DBA. You often hear that one man can make a difference, and in Andy's case, Robbie was and is that man.

By teaming up with both Nettwerk and Robbie, Andy Hunter⁰ gained not only the creative freedom that he needed to do this album, but also the additional creative expertise of a man who has years of experience working with dance music and electronic music in general as both a musician and a producer and who already understands how Andy works. Tedd T. is a good producer, but his work on other dance projects has not been any where as good as his pop and rock ones.

Colour is a standout album. It also, like most good albums, takes you on a journey through multiple genres and dimensions. Starting off the album is "Sound Pollution", a breaks track that grooves on for about four or five minutes before Andy's vocals smoothly come in. Next up is "Stars", which if anything is the "Amazing" of this album. It's the first single and is likely going to be the biggest one.  "Shine" comes in next and features the vocals of the lovely Shaz Sparks, who is Robbie's wife and the other half of DBA.

I won't go through the entire track listing, but you get the idea. Lots of top-notch talent, some throwbacks to the past, and overall a move from what used to be breaks and trance to more house-based sounds and, in the case of tracks like "Miracle", a more down-tempo sound. All in all, the album has a guest list that features not only Robbie and Shaz but also Mark Underdown, Midge Ure, D'Morgan, Cathy Burton, and probably a few others here and there.

Over all, I think my favorite tracks include the house track "Technicolour", the down-tempo "Fade",   the trancey "You", and then of course "Stars".  Overall, if I could compare the album to any other album out there, it would have to be what Moby has produced over the past few years. Hotel would be a fairly close match. Production wise, all of my complaints regarding over compression and really harsh sounds are gone with this album.

All that said, there are a few drawbacks. The first is that some of the lyrics are either too minimal or cheesy. "You" is a track about the Trinity. While the track starts off great, eventually the full lyric kicks in and from a non-Christian perspective just sound hokey.  Even from a Christian perspective, it's a bit thin, like most praise songs today. "Sound Pollution" makes even less sense. It's hard to believe that such lyrics could exist on the same album as "Fade", which has some of the most profound lyrics I've heard in a long time. Maybe I'm just a stick in the mud, but lyrically, this album doesn't fully live up to the 9.0 rating I'm giving it.

The only other problem with the album is that there are not that many tracks I would consider using in a club because they are down-tempo in nature. Granted, some remixes could easily fix this. From an album perspective though, these same tracks will make it last in my book.

Again, let me just re-emphasis how good this album is. It's Amazing. I do think much of this is the creative freedom Nettwerk has given Andy and also his creative partnership with Robbie that has brought this gem forth. If you get a chance, at least preview this album the next time you are in a store. It's too beautiful to ignore.