Back in 2004 I got this double CD called A State of Trance 2004 from Armin van Buuren. It was a pair of continually mixed CD's of oomp-tiss-oomp-tiss-oomp-tiss music that I sampled after hearing one of the tracks on a DirecTV music channel. Trance is good for keeping you alert without engaging you too much. At least that's the case with most of it. And this van Buuren guy seems to have an ear for mixing it and improving it too.

I can remember spending a lot of productive time writing my book and writing code listening to that CD, even though there were only a couple of real stand-out tracks on there. It worked really well as background music.

So I ordered the 2007 mix from Amazon (the iTunes version didn't break it up by tracks, just two complete mixed files), and it provides more of the same. It actually calls the CD's differently. The first is "On The Beach," which is a little lighter, less bass heavy. The second, stronger disc, is called "In The Club." I haven't really decided that there are any real stand-outs just yet, but I've only listened to it through once.

That second disc actually starts with two of his own tracks, which are pretty good. His album Shivers from last year was pretty sweet overall. He should stick to creating his own junk, since most stuff in the genre is forgettable.