Drunk, after a weekend of excess, I missed my early morning flight to Alicante. No worries – I was able to get one later in the day. This was last July. I was picked up at the airport and taken to Little Britain, ex-patriot central. We dived into bars run by people called Dave and witnessed fights between proper English sorts who couldn’t cope with the combination of Sun Cream and alcohol required.

We bypassed Benidorm on the way to better parts of Spain.

Perhaps, if we had taken time to explore, we might have bumped into Koudlam. For his new record, Benidorm dream, the French producer holed himself up in one of the many high rises that dominate the Benidorm horizon. Like a modern day JG Ballard, Koudlam clearly saw rich pickings in his surrounds. Here we have a very postmodern, dystopian dance vision; a dream that conjures up scapes of land and sound that have an almost hymnal element – futuristic and yet rooted in the here and now.

It’s an album that was never conceived to be an easy listen. It’s not something to play if you want to snuggle up with your loved one on the sofa. There’s something pretty rotten going on in the Benidorm streets and Koudlam wants us to know he’s angry about it. But, it’s not all bluster and beats. The waves subside and a wash of calm saunters past – a temporary oasis amidst the fights, the seediness and the monstrous desperation. Almost hypnotic, this is how this part of Spain could be if we dare to dream with a positive spin.

We wander around, darkly dysfunctional. We head to a new party and pretend the drugs are designer. We wear flags on our shaven heads to be both symbol and sun-block. We pretend we’re having fun as we piss against walls and tag unfinished building sites.

We reach out to the mountains in the distance. Up there, we might get a fill of clean air; a swim in a waterfall sent from paradise.

Benidorm dreams.

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