Following in the footsteps of
Avicii, Dragan Roganović, aka
Dirty South, goes pop on
With You, his 2014 album which doubles as the soundtrack to the short film that the EDM producer directed. The film was an afterthought, since Dragan found his indie pop-influenced songs to be like stories, and while that just might be because they have lyrics, the other choices made here aren't so wide-eyed or novice. "Walking on the Sun" is a brilliant example of what
Underworld would sound like if they debuted in the era of
Arcade Fire, while "Unbreakable" finds Sam Martin pleasingly confusing himself with singer
Sam Smith and turning the EDM crowd onto the emotional build-up rather than just the bass drop. At worst, the album gets hung up on the widescreen sound of
Coldplay and swoons at the very thought of breathing in and out, and yet "Freefallin," with Gita Lake, is as brittle and free-spirited as
Kate Bush, while "Tunnel Vision," with
SomeKindaWonderful, is sinister video game music with tasteful restraint, or a perfect soundtrack for slowly docking into space ports. Making it all hang together is the hard part, and the LP certainly suffers from putting wistful bliss right next to blissful wistfulness, but as EDM producers on pop larks go,
With You is a satisfying experiment. ~ David Jeffries