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Based on the orchestral theme from Braveheart and featuring the vocals of Janet Taylor, this "epic mix of cinematic sound and solid dancefloor rhythm" was a No. 3 hit for leading German producer DJ Sakin, in February 1999.And the cover versions just keep coming. The vocal refrain doesn't seem to form part of James Horner's original orchestration, though it's not exactly lyrically deep, and nor is it meant to be. The whole point is for Sakin (Bozkurt) and his friends (who include Torsten Stenzel of York "fame") to pick on a familiar theme and remodel it for trance clubs. And I can see that they've succeeded to the extent that this sounds like a trance record to me, pulling out all the usual sounds you'd expect.
This for me is the nub of the problem, trance is perhaps the most difficult type of music on the albums for me to get my head around. It seems so determinedly and openly formulaic that the appeal of each individual track is more elusive to me; not that rock, hip-hop, RnB and other types of music are any less prone to formula in reality, but there seems to be more of an incentive there to pretend otherwise. To an outsider, it feels like the trance audience are actively seeking to hear the same sounds over and over again on every track, the same synths, the same breakdowns, the same beats and a very small range of tempo. That's fine if that's what they want but it does make it harder for the rest of us to understand. Meanwhile it leaves me wondering why the track wasn't called "Protect Your Mind (Braveheart)' on its original UK release, as it seems to be now - I'd guess there must have been some contractual issues about the use of the film title on an unofficial product. Perhaps there's some story about how much of this music seems to be made by second-generation immigrants to Germany too.
Available on: Protect Your Mind - Braveheart
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