pedro

What nonsense! First of all, I am not sure what "genre" you are talking about. Rephlex themselves have quite a wide variety of styles. Rephlex did came up with a term, "Braindance", as a catchall for their music (and as an alternative to the equally ludicrous "IDM" term), but nobody ever took that seriously. There were other labels putting out very influential electronic music in the 1990s. In fact, one of them, Warp (which also released Aphex Twin's output, as well as Autechre), easily eclipsed Rephlex. Pedro

Venetian Snares are nowhere on par with Autechre and Aphex Twin, the latter two were important artists in the development of electronic music in the 1990's. Aphex Twin's albums can be quite different (make that VERY different) from each other which makes a single recommendation rather difficult. If I had to choose, my personal preference is "I Care Because You Do". In Drukgs it sounds as he is using old, previously discarded material, despite some cracking tracks. Actually, the best release, in my view, by Aphex Twin is clearly his remixes - specifically "26 Mixes For Cash". No household should be without one. I can recommend that one without any reservation whatsoever. Pedro

There is nothing fun about cheesy crap. Pedro

2008 was a good year. In no particular order (I have added a * to my top five): Heartthrob - Dear painter, paint me* Argy - Focus on Loco Dice - 7 Dunham Place Martini Bros - The MB Factor Wighnomy Brothers - Metawuffmischfelge* Mikkel Metal - Peaks And Troughs* Various - Lagos Shake Pluxus - Solid State Toby Tobias - Space Shuttle* 2562 - Aerial Flying Lotus - Los Angeles* Falko Brocksieper - Heavy Day Ezekiel Honig - Surfaces Of A Broken Marching Band Eine Kleine Nacht Musik Efdemin - Carry On, Pretend We're Not In The Room Extrawelt - Schone Neue Extrawelt Plus three fantastic Italian 1970s Cosmic Rock/Disco compilations. It is not electronic, but it is dance and it is history. (1) Various/Daniele Baldelli - Cosmic (The Original), (2) Baia Degli Angeli 1, (3) Baia Degli Angeli 2 Enjoy! Pedro

By quite a big margin, the best internet site that I know is Juno (juno.co.uk). Pedro

Here go my votes: Accelerate: 1;Electrypnose; Funked Up; Digital Psionics 2;Tegma; Lo-fi Adventures; Tribal Vision 3;Various; Unconventional; Horns and Hoofs 4;Various;Psionic Entity; Digital Psionics 5;Various; Cabaret; Tribal Vision Decelerate: 1;Hol Bauman; Human; Ultimae 2;Kick Bong; Flower Power; Cosmicleaf 3;Various; Future Memories; Interchill Pedro

I liked this album. I had already heard them at Boom Festival in August so I had a fair idea of what to expect. It is not a very flashy album and it may not feel like obviously brilliant, especially at first. It is a rather subtle but still intriguing and enjoyable. I find it a very relaxing and spliff-friendly album. The album also has an unusually smooth flow - the tracks really all do fit together. I liked it, but Midi Milliz and Spirallianz fans should give it a listen instead of buying it blind. Recommended. Pedro

I have to review my stance on the album. Although it could do with some editing here and there, this is a quite surprisingly enjoyable CD. It might not be particularly "psychedelic", but it definitely stands the test of time in terms of listening pleasure. I am changing my view to "Recommended". Pedro

My votes go for Hol Baumann (Human) and Distant System (Spiral Empire). Followed by Interchill's Future Memories - although it is less fresh sounding than the first two, it is still a very pleasant release. I recommend all three. Pedro

FSOL? Ha! Forget about FSOL. Egyptian Lover is playing...that brings back memories of my youth in the early 80s... Now all sing with me --- "Egyptian Lover, Egyptian Lover Baby". And 2 Bad Mice and Altern8 are playing, too. Where do they get these people? I thought they were all dead by now. Pedro

Well, Ray was by far the more talented. But David Davies was a very capable guitar player. It is come as a surprise to me to know that Abakus (he of the That Much Closer to the Sun fame) is David Davies's son. Real name: Russ Davies. His first album was one of the best downtempo releases to come out in 2004. And Russell now has a new release - We Share The Same Dreams. Although I haven't listed to rock/pop for many years, when I was a younger man I was a big Kinks fan. Real big. And I still believe that the only people who could match Ray Davies's songwriting capabilites were the Lennon-McCartney duo and Bon Dylan. I struggle to find anybody else... Pedro

I very much liked Prometheus's last CD - Corridor of Mirrors. But this CD is simply not well thought out. Prometheus is obviously a talented bugger, but he should stay clear of Raja Ram. The opening track is dreadful and it gets worse (such as track 6). The very last track is decent, but it doesn't save the day. Where are the Taste Police when we need them? This sort of stuff should never see the light of day. Not recommended. Pedro

Another good release from Kino Oko. For my money, it is the best one so far. It is nice to hear people trying to make something different and trying to find their own unique voice. Not every track on it is a winner, but this is still a very welcome CD and well deserving of the plaudits of our little world. Recommended. Pedro

This must be one of the more impressive releases so far this year. I did not enjoy his initial stuff, but I feel Electrypnose is now certainly making some interesting music. Recommended. Pedro

I would agree with comments that there is more to bad sound than just over-compression. Good mastering is more than just getting the right level of compression. Which brings up the topic of what is the "right level". As has been pointed out, most music is made to sound better not with the audiophile in mind, but rather in the more popular forms of consumption. It is also why much music have their mids completely exaggerated. Cos it sounds good on a boom-box, or on a cheap radio in a car, etc. But over-compression is indeed a problem. Sure it is necessary to have some compression, otherwise you would easily blow out your system listening to music. But too much compression does means too little dynamics (as it has been pointed out). And that is awful as well. I have a very high-end hifi sound system at home and you would not believe just how badly compressed is a lot of music. You notice over-compression the most when it is a band or an orchestra playing. Fortunately, there are lots of audiophile classical music music labels. When it comes to psy-trance, I think there are examples of good mastering and poor mastering. But given the low budgets, I often think the jobs could be worse. It is when the majors put out ublistenable stuff, that it drives me mad. But here is an audiophile tip for headphone users - get a headphone amp. Best upgrade you can do. I use a Ray Samuels Audio Tomahawk for my Nano Ipod. The Tomahawk is very small and light - and it will drive all but the more demanding headphones (such as Sennheiser 600 - my preferred home headphones). At home, I use a Graham Slee Solo (with the upgraded power supply). It will drive anything. Both make listening more worthwhile. Pedro PS Radi - is it not time you hanged up your boots and changed tact? Your joke is getting rather stale...

Interesting indeed! Why not give them LSD (as long as they are warned) ? A few might falter, but a lot of these upstanding, good church folk might just well enjoy and tolerate it nicely. They would just be exchanging one type of fantasy-land for another. Pedro

So, Sunwolf, you are going to introduce your righteous church-folk to the salacious pleasures of goa trance? Or do you mean psy-trance? Probably does not matter I suppose. The key thing is that it seems you want some spiritual message or words in them. But do you really need some silly "Go Jesus go! Rah, rah, rah!" lyrics in the track? Furthermore, the vast majority tracks in psy-trance do not have references to either drugs or to buddhas. You KNOW it as well as we do. So just play tracks that you find enjoyable and that you believe might make those mighty, god-fearing, good folks in your church feel compelled and inspired to wiggle their asses. I suppose if there are enough individuals like you then a new sub-genre might be even in the works - Christan Psy-trance! And we can add this to all the other types of obsequiously religious music such as Christian rock, Christian country and Christian rap. The Lord Jesus would be proud... Pedro

Joey is from New York, but he was putting out his stuff in Belgium - the R&S label no less. So it does sound like New Beat, which of course was created when people started slowing down the BPM of hardcore house music to create this slower, but more menacing sounding stuff (rumour was that they initially started playing 45 stuff on 33). Hence it may sound slow to us (and it is - only 122 BPM, similar to a lot of NewBeat). But at the same time, it has a lot of the feel of the trance music as well. A revelation when I first heard it (although I loathe the "ecstasy ecstasy" bit, which is naff). Pedro

I meant Joey of course.

Joey Beltram - Energy Flash Pedro

Unconventional came out at the same time as Chronika Chapter III and with 6 of its 10 tracks done by artists also on the latter compilation. There was a time when the Horns and Hoofs roster was more different from Boshke Beats. I like both compilations, and if anything I found Unconventional marginally bit more fun, contrary to my initial expectations. I liked all the tracks except 1, 3 (I really can't get into Alic's style) and 7 (Metalogic tends to be really hit and miss for me as well). I was pleasantly surprised to see Triac on this comp, under the name of Sophicos; hope he keeps up the good work. Recommended. Pedro

Psychaos/Joti Sidhu has (and rightly so) plenty of street creed in the psy trance world. And as others have pointed out, he has a long pedigree by the scene's standards. We don't speak much about him nowadays because he has done not anything special in last few years and, frankly speaking, may not do so again. Pedro

I really did enjoy this CD. I found the music both relaxing and interesting. Much better than the average colourless psy-ambient we often hear. I would say this is my favourite single artist release on Ultimae and very deserving of a listen. For the record, I did not have any Hol Baumann tracks so all the tracks were new to me. Highly recommended. Pedro

Note: After four years of typing away in the psynews.org, I have finally earned enough posts to become a happy mushroom. I do sprout slowly... Pedro

Boom is not usually a big-time purveyor of pop trance (although there have been a few horrible exceptions over the years). So, you don't have to fear for pop trance. At the same time, as it has already been pointed out - old style psy-trance is not what is usually being dished out either (thank god!). But there will be a wide enough variety of psy-trance (and a bit of other genres too!) to keep most of us entertained. At night-time the music in 2006 did seem to go overboard on the dark side - that is perhaps my only concern. Although, others would disagree with me and claim that the night music was the highlight of the festival. Recommended. Pedro