Well well, finally it is upon us. So many years in the making, the debut album from John ‘00’ Fleming, more commonly known as J00F, finally makes an appearance. Titled Nine Lives, it comes from a man known for some amazing productions over the years – both by himself and alongside others – and some epic sets that have left many breathless.

The album opens up with The Winds of Change Are Blowing, a seven-minute epic that typifies that trance sound J00F has absolutely nailed in recent years and has made his productions some of the most cutting edge and simultaneously representative of what trance used to be. Then we take off on United 93 [listen below], a collaboration with Airwave (and assumingly named after one of the planes that went down on 9/11), which drops the tempo back considerably but still allows for some serious fist-punching, with a solid, deep bassline that makes an appearance more than once on the album.

Two tracks in, and I couldn’t help but think that things were looking damn promising. We roll into MMX1215 and Dense Clouds, and things get distinctly Indian. Fleming has made no secret of the fact that this album has been heavily influenced by his extensive travels to the sub-continent and nowhere is it more obvious than here.

Then things get…well, strange.

A Far Off Place [listen below] is very unlike Fleming: soft, mellow – hell, it even has vocals. Fight The Darkness and Bumble Lights are points in the album that we probably could have done without. The latter in particular is just plain bizarre. But then again as a debut artist album more than a decade in the making, surely we can allow some creative license.

Further still, when you have absolutely blistering tunes like New Beginning and Finding Ganeesha that nail that J00F sound, there’s even more reason for all to be forgiven. They represent two distinct climaxes on the album, and it is little surprise that they blew many a mind on his recent tour, this writer’s included.

Last Night A DJ Saved My Night and 1440 Minutes (a reference to the 24 hours it took Fleming to put the tune together) bang it out a touch harder, and will similarly keep the punters happy. Trancelucent is almost like a Brit-pop moment, Never Forgotten has a serious touch of the uplifting to it, before it all ends with a collaboration with E-Clip in the form of Sym*bol*ism [listen below], which gives us a last fix of that truly infectious driving bassline that we know so well.

All up, the album has a few surprises and maybe even a few WTF moments. But as a debut album, it has allowed J00F to explore a few different sounds. And explore he definitely has. It is disappointing in parts, yes, but some of the tunes are so damn good that forgiveness comes easy.

Nine Lives is out now.