Paul van Dyk

Although he shies away from the label these days, Paul van Dyk is one of the undisputed masters of trance. His music is like the aural version of Utopian visions from the '70s of a sterile, computer-controlled future populated by people in white jumpsuits and flowing robes, gliding from place to place on silently efficient monorails and eating food pills. Everything is clean, perfect and seamless, with surging builds that continually push the energy level up and up. Van Dyk built his reputation on the strength of tracks such as "For an Angel" and huge remixes, including Humate's "Love Stimulation" and Binary Finary's "1998," songs that have come to define the essence of the trance sound. As the style's popularity has waned, so, too, has van Dyk's, but for adherents of the sound, he is still an unimpeachable icon. Now celebrating the release of his latest album, In Between, van Dyk brings his slick, futuristic sound to the trance-loving clubbers of Denver this Thursday, June 26, at Beta.