Some records belong to their moment. Others keep finding new listeners. ‘Last Night I Was Dreaming’ first took shape 25 years ago through Lance Jordan and vocalist Dr. T, before Creamer & K brought their own dancefloor reading to the record. Since then, the song has continued to reach younger DJs and listeners without losing the emotional pull of the original.
Photo courtesy of the artists. Composite image by Electronic Groove.
Now, with new remixes from Cevin Fisher, Adnan Senol, and Pascal Junior, the track returns through Glenn Morrison’s Fall From Grace. In conversation with EG, John Creamer and Lance Jordan recall the chance meetings, fast studio decisions, and personal bonds behind the record, while considering why certain pieces of club music simply refuse to age.
EG: Hi John and Lance, welcome to Electronic Groove. John, you are in Argentina, while Lance is in New York. As the release approaches, what is it like to see this record return 25 years after its original creation?
John Creamer: Argentina. I’m excited about the release and the new remixes breathing life into a timeless classic!
Lance Jordan: I’m still in New York, lol. I’m also very excited about this release, as I am very proud of the work we did on it.
It is hard to believe it has been 25 years since its initial creation. I remember when we got the original test pressing back. I listened to it at home and thought to myself, “Wow, this is a classic record!” I’m glad its legacy gets to live on.
EG: Take us back to the beginning. How did your creative paths first cross, and what convinced you that there was something worth pursuing together?
John Creamer: Stephane and I were writing original tracks that needed vocals. Susana was a candidate who then found Lance through a mutual friend, and they recorded some vocals for our tracks. That’s how our relationship started, and we began working together on several projects, including ‘Last Night I Was Dreaming’.
Lance Jordan: I had a recording studio in downtown New York, only about a mile from John and Stephane’s, but our paths did not cross until Susana came to my studio.
She was the vocalist on the NY Love releases ‘Storm Is Rising’ and ‘The Healing’, and she had been referred by a mutual friend and producer, Stymie K, whose name was ironically similar to Stephane K. He suggested that she come to my studio to record vocals on several instrumental tracks that John and Stephane were producing and circulating in search of singers.
The first couple of sessions went well enough that, when John and Steph heard them, they were impressed with my vocal recording and songwriting experience. John and I soon met in person and hit it off pretty well.
I had other projects and vocalists I was working with, including Dr. T. I gave John and Stephane a copy of my original mix of ‘Last Night I Was Dreaming’, and John decided it was a record he wanted to be involved with.
He and Stephane did a very respectful and proper dancefloor remix, which complemented my deeper house original. This eventually led to us forming NY Love Records around what was becoming a large collection of tracks we had worked on together.
EG: That first connection came through a series of chance encounters. Lance, before any remix plans entered the picture, what emotion were you trying to capture in the original track?
Lance Jordan: I remember being alone in my studio, very distinctly wanting to create a moody deep house track. In an inspired hour or so, I put together most, if not all, of the entire instrumental for ‘Last Night I Was Dreaming’. Immediately, I thought, “I need a soulful male vocal for this.”
Perhaps less than a week later, Dr. T knocked on my studio door to say hello. He had hired me some months earlier to mix some tracks he had done with his partner.
I sat him down and told him I had a track that needed a male vocal. I put the instrumental on, and right away he began singing, “Last night I was dreaming, so intense that I could feel you.”
I asked him, “What is that?”
He replied, “I just made it up.”
I turned on the microphone and hit record. He did a few takes of the main sections. Then I said, “Okay, do some ad-libs,” which became the humming and the section where he sang “feel it.”
“Keep going, go for it,” I said, and he sang the “I don’t know, I don’t know, I don’t know” section.
The whole recording session took less than 15 minutes, and I knew I had the hit vocal I had been hoping for. After a little editing and mixing, the original version was basically finished.
This is a most unusual story of a magical record being born in real time. I knew there was an emotion in me that needed to be expressed in that track, and somehow it all came together like magic.
EG: John, you have built several lasting creative partnerships. What tells you that another artist understands your musical language and can follow the work through properly?
John Creamer: The proof is in the pudding. It is when someone gets quality work finished to a professional level and sees things through to the actual final release.
“This is a most unusual story of a magical record being born in real time.”
EG: That sense of follow-through became part of the foundation. How did four distinct personalities find a shared direction while keeping each person’s contribution intact?
John Creamer: Stephane and I had been working together since 1995 and had many big releases together, so our sound and style were pretty well established. Then, when I met Lance, we also clicked while working together, and he already had a working relationship with Dr. T.
Lance Jordan: It was a natural development, where mutual tastes and interests intersected in the type of collaboration that could not have been planned any better.
Many planets had to align to bring this union together, and it felt largely like destiny. There was not a lot of consultation or heavy thinking about it. The pieces pretty much all fell into place.
EG: Lance, Creamer & K had recently been named Remix Magazine’s Remixers of the Year. What did joining forces with them mean for you at that stage of your career?
Lance Jordan: For me, it was a fortunate move to join forces with Creamer & K, as they had recently won Remix Magazine’s Remixers of the Year award in 2001.
My DJ and production career was in its early stages, so working with such a well-respected team as C & K was both an honor and a privilege. I grew a strong respect for their artistic accomplishments and the world-renowned remixes that had already taken over the dance music world.
EG: John, after so many years working with Stephane, was the element of surprise still part of the process, or was consistency one of the partnership’s main strengths?
John Creamer: Since we had developed our sound over a long period of time working together, there were not too many surprises. We had a unified idea about our style and sound, and we preferred to stick within that.
EG: A record this familiar can be difficult to reinterpret. What did the versions by Adnan Senol, Pascal Junior, and Cevin Fisher reveal about the strength of the original?
John Creamer: Well, the vocal and song were very strong to begin with and had hit potential from the start.
From my perspective, everyone had so much respect for the original that it might have been challenging to remix it with “fresh ears,” but I feel that everyone did a good job on these new remixes.
Lance Jordan: I’d be lying if I did not say I was biased toward the original released versions, my original mix, and Creamer & K’s very respectful remix.
It said a lot to me that they did not make any drastic changes to the original version, but adapted it for the big room sound. The song is a deep one.
When we spoke with Cevin about doing a remix, he even said, “It is a hard one to remix because the original versions are so strong.” I feel that Cevin did an excellent job.
The other remixes were technically bootlegs, which I had only recently found on SoundCloud earlier this year, while we were already planning the anniversary release.
Both the Adnan Senol and Pascal Junior remixes pay respect to the original versions, yet bring something fresh to the table within deep and progressive house.
EG: Lance, the record brought almost immediate attention from major DJs and clubs. What did that experience teach you about trust, patience, and sharing creative control?
Lance Jordan: It literally taught me everything!
I had wise instincts that having a release alongside Creamer & K could only be a good thing. They gave early promos to the likes of Danny Tenaglia, who opened Pacha Ibiza with ‘Last Night’, Deep Dish, Sander Kleinenberg, Steve Lawler, Erick Morillo, Roger Sanchez, Hernán Cattáneo, Nick Warren, Dave Seaman, and David Morales.
So yes, it was almost instant, overnight notoriety for me. It was a career breakthrough moment, which opened so many doors to future work, gigs, and releases.
While we were all young, highly creative, and opinionated, we did our best to maintain respect and keep a good working relationship. Nobody lives in a bubble, let alone thrives in one.
These are things I kept in mind as we traversed the perils of the musician lifestyle, lol!
“If I spend too much time thinking about whether the current track I am working on will be timeless or not, I probably will not get much work done.”
EG: John, remix culture once connected artists, scenes, and generations in a powerful way. What does a remix need to offer today beyond simply making a record functional for another dancefloor?
John Creamer: Fuck me! I don’t have a great answer, but if I like it, I trust my instincts.
EG: That instinct also speaks to why certain records remain relevant. What gives a piece of club music enough character to last beyond its original release campaign?
John Creamer: Being timeless is the key, and a song with a strong vocal and hit potential can be the thing that makes a track timeless and instantly recognizable. ‘Last Night’ is a perfect example of that.
Lance Jordan: I agree with John. You cannot plan to make a “timeless” record, or can you? In this case, we hit the mark.
If I spend too much time thinking about whether the current track I am working on will be timeless or not, I probably will not get much work done.
The best I can do is control what I can, and that is to always try to make the best quality work.
EG: Lance, Glenn Morrison and Fall From Grace are providing the home for this anniversary edition. What did Glenn understand about the record, and why did the label feel right for this chapter?
Lance Jordan: Glenn seemed to really embrace the idea of this release as a well-known classic that many younger DJs and fans are only now discovering.
We still get tons of comments on YouTube showing that younger and newer fans can discover older tracks that do not sound old and, in fact, withstand the test of time.
Enthusiasm is a key ingredient in any successful project, and Glenn surely has plenty of that!
EG: Looking beyond this release, what has revisiting the record opened between you creatively, and where would you like the relationship to go next?
John Creamer: It opened the doors to do more work together, including revisiting and releasing other prior works, as well as new projects in the future.
Lance Jordan: For me, this has been a long time coming, as we had talked about a 20-year anniversary rerelease, but the timing was not right.
I had taken several years off from producing music while I focused more on my software development career and raising my daughter. I have more recently returned to making records and writing songs.
With other recent and upcoming releases, it feels like revisiting and reinvigorating my working relationship with John is exactly the thing to launch me into the next phase of my musical journey.
Over the years, John and I have become very close friends, and I consider him like a brother to me. He was the first person to show up at the hospital the day my daughter was born!
We intend to go deeper into the archives to pull out unreleased gems and possible reworks of some of our earlier classics.
EG: John and Lance, thank you for your time. All the best with the release and everything that follows.
John Creamer: Thanks for the exposure and support. We really appreciate it. Hopefully, we will get to speak again about future projects.
Lance Jordan: Thank you for your interest and support. We look forward to speaking with you again in the near future.
John Creamer, Stephane K, Lance Jordan ft. Dr. T – ‘Last Night I Was Dreaming’ is available via Fall From Grace Records. Purchase your copy here.
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Follow Lance Jordan: Spotify | Instagram
