Lucas Oggier: "That's It"

When you think of mainstream European dance music, you think of this. That is just a fact. But in spite of the Sexophone and its fellow monstrosities tipping the world’s white blood cells against disco-cheese, there are DJs out there on the continental dance scene who can cut it beyond that first round of Früli. Lucas Oggier is one, and he’s evolved sufficiently to have the revelation that the best years for mixing have been done with, so off he goes back to 1997, lampooning/celebrating his roots (typical Swiss—he’s neutral). Here, Music2000 for the Playstation One was just a dim crystal ball: if you wanted to write your own dance tune here, you needed synths, a proper drum cartridge, and a manual on how to reboot keyboards. A steady relationship with Positiva Records also didn’t come a miss, but hey—that never stopped BBE, so why should it trip up LO? He’s got Convert Recordings looking over his shoulder. He’s got a continent that’s grown by twelve countries.

“That’s It,” Oggier’s first official single, is an anthemic little cheeseball from the golden era of trance, bathed in the kind of cosmic hisses that once helped break the Conservatives. A typical quick-peaker, the bass hook couldn’t scream “I am the nineties” any louder if it ran up and invited you snake-boarding, and as the trumpeted synth pattern skids into formation, whole layers of progression are torn free till you’re tapping at an OMD fossil. Like all the best trance it’s as repetitive as it is fun, and—if you could only glue on some cod-satirical lyrics—a tweak or two could turn it into a future LCD Soundsystem smash. That might be a tall order at seven minutes long, though, and if you haven’t got the stomach for long trance climbdowns you better either swallow pills or whistle for a taxi (your legs are going to hate you in the morning). As for that “Ah, the past” part of your brain: a simple itch has been scratched. There. Right there. That’s it.