Alice Deejay – Better Off Alone

I am curious what others think in terms of the quality for this. I own multiple copies of the original but hearing some of the sample clips for this release on a few of the record sites sound like this pressing may favor the highs and lack some of the lows. You need that organic bass of the 90-s / early 00's left in tact.

Why people name this tune cheese, is beyond my understanding, and I'm a trance producer..maybe this tune isn't "fully" trance more like euro style, dance with a club feeling, basic construction of percussion and bass, the lead is iconic, the vocals are good..

While this is very much a 'pop' trance single as well as a club hit, it's interesting to note that this release may be the highest-charting CD single in UK chart history that didn't come with a radio edit. Due to a frustrating change in chart eligibility criteria in 1998, for CD single sales to count towards chart positions the total running time had to be less than 25 minutes rather than 40 minutes as it was as of 1992. For most labels, to stay within the time limit they ditched remixes and 12" versions, much to the chagrin of CD DJs.

Positiva bravely took the decision to forego a radio edit for Better Off Alone and put three full-length mixes on the CD instead. A radio edit was made and used on the airwaves and also appeared on compilations, but given how many copies of this single were sold and the fact it made the Top Ten is surely a testament to how massive trance was back in 1999.

Horrible mix! There's a reason it's "unofficial". Cause it's crap.

I bought everything Positiva put out at this time. When I first heard this I thought it was a bit bland compared to their usual output but it became a massive tune.I like the Dumonde mix, not least because it has no vocals in. Not that they're bad, just borderline cheese as already mentioned. Just listening to the original now I notice it lacks a lot of weight compared to the other 2 tracks. Thought this was down to there being 2 tracks on one side but doesn't seem to have affected the Signum mix.

Pretty sure this was used as the backing to some track a while ago and was a hit, which shows its longevity. There were also a few bootlegs doing the rounds at the time (one with Rozalla vocals comes to mind), which was clever as I don't think an instrumental was ever released.

Play Jam X and DeLeon's Hard Trance mix and forget the other cheesy Top of the Pops mixes

No bad, but hardly genius. It's cheese, and only just gets away with it by the skin of its teeth. 3/5.

RS: Where did the idea for "Better Off Alone" come from?
Pronti: I came up with the sentence "Do you think you're better off alone" when the love of my life had left me. It's kind of ironic cause I never even told her the song was about her. I never saw her again. It made the emotion of the song as real as it gets. One simple line that said it all. The track was instrumental at first, but I started humming the vocal melody while the track was playing and we decided to add vocals. That turned out to be a wise decision..

RS: How was Alice Deejay created?
Kalmani: Nobody expected "Better Off Alone" to become such a worldwide hit. Jurgen wanted to stay the underground club DJ that he was, so we asked Judy to perform the song. It was then that we decided to call it Alice Deejay.

I remember this being the track where at the time, i was new to trance, and saw this classified as trance. I loved this track when it was doing the rounds on promo. It tore up the clubs, it obviously crossed over and became a major hit. I still to this day hear this in clubs, which indicates just how good it is. Yes it's cheesy, yes its a simply melody, but if you were a clubber back in the summer of 1999, this tune was awesome.

The signum mix is also very good, but not their best work.

This single is one of alice deejay's best singles ever. The song Better Off Alone toped international charts world wide and was a major dancehit.