DJ Dara

As commentators have noted, DJ Dara's 2001 effort for Moonshine Records, aptly titled Future Perfect, was a somewhat impenetrable and incredibly charged mix of some of the genre's better tune maestros. For the climate last year, Dara's mix was a welcome relief from the frequently mediocre road the genre was walking. The 2002 follow-up continues with some more of the same, and as such it isn't as vastly surprising as one would expect and demand of Dara. The hyper-kinetic beats are still intact and the mix opens with "Curtains" by one of the genre's most vital names, DJ SS, and the track is a hard-hitting testament to his influence on drum & bass evolution in the early '90s. There aren't as many vocal-oriented tracks here as with Future Perfect, however, making the overall mood far more terrifyingly surreal. But there are genuinely tuneful and even delight-inspiring numbers, as with Moving Fusion's "Thunderball" and the beautiful "5 Times In One Night," by John B. Dara is a mix master and Further reiterates that much. However, it is not really an adventurous departure and as such presents nothing new for fans of the genre.