Danny L Harle's Cerulean is being marketed as his debut album, despite the fact that his actual debut, Harlecore, was released in 2021. The new record boasts a heavyweight guest list including Dua Lipa, Clairo, Caroline Polachek, PinkPantheress, and MNEK, reflecting Harle's rise in the pop production world. He has previously worked with Polachek, Florence + the Machine, and Dua Lipa, among others.
Musically, Cerulean draws heavily on early 2000s pop-trance and Eurodance, reminiscent of the Clubland compilations and BBC Radio 1 hits. Harle presents this with high seriousness, describing the album as his message. A press release mentions influences ranging from Renaissance composer Monteverdi to Y2K club bangers by Eiffel 65, though the latter's impact is far more evident on tracks like Laa, Te Re Re, and Island (Da Da Da).
The album's earnestness invites accusations of taking the piss, especially when tracks like Laa feature a hook similar to Darude's Sandstorm played on synthesised panpipes, or Island (Da Da Da) melds trance with a jaunty accordion. However, Harle may be performing a genuine salvage operation on music he loved in his youth, as suggested by Azimuth, which blends pop-trance with melodramatic gothy hard rock reminiscent of Evanescence, sounding like a latter-day Eurovision entry.
Cerulean includes beatless instrumentals, a 75-second Clairo track that shifts from unaccompanied vocals to cinematic strings, and a PinkPantheress collaboration that is wilfully plasticky. What it lacks, however, is a pop melody as undeniable as N-Trance's Set You Free or Fragma's Toca's Miracle. The album's appeal will likely depend on how fondly listeners recall the era of Cascada and Trance Nation compilations. For others, it may be a sugary, intense experience that causes involuntary teeth-gritting.
