Basilisk

My latest mix marks a return to heavy psychedelic trance. I've spent most of the last several years exploring all sorts of other styles and really only making glancing contact with modern psytrance but here's four hours of cutting edge sounds, mostly darkpsy, with some twilight full-on and new school Goa trance. As usual for my long-form mixes of the 2020s you can expect some more ambient, breakbeat-oriented, and experimental sounds at the beginning and end, so please listen with an open mind! Full track list and other details can be found on my site: https://djbasilisk.com/mixes/esoteric-expanse-6/

Full info, track listing, and even cue sheets (does anyone still use those?) for Cytherean Expanse now available on my site: https://djbasilisk.com/mixes/esoteric-expanse-5/

The fifth entry in the Expanse Cycle explores dark disco, acid techno, progressive house, dub, and IDM, all with a psychedelic touch. Soft launch on SoundCloud now, with full info and wide release coming soon:

My tribute to French psytrance from around the turn of the millennium is now available on my usual channels. (It's the same one posted in the second message in this thread.) Full info and track listing on my site: https://djbasilisk.com/mixes/ybyzar-19/

I have another hefty mix out today, this time focusing on the minimal wave of the early years of the new millennium. It's 4+ hours long and covers a lot of ground, but mainly focuses on quirky technoid rhythms and brutal beats. Full info and track listing available on my site: https://djbasilisk.com/mixes/transmissions-from-valhalla/

I think they'll be offering the MP3 for download to Patreon subscribers. In six months I'll post it on my channels (including my website with download links) so check back later

My guest mix for Psybient.org is now live on SoundCloud! It's a heady mix of ambient, downtempo, nu-disco, Goa trance, dub techno, and plenty more: Full info available here: https://www.psybient.org/love/psybient-org-podcast-ep-44/

I have another new mix out this month, the fourth chapter of the Esoteric Expanse series, which focuses on ambitious cross-genre journeys. 76 tracks and nearly 5 hours of cutting edge techno, psytrance, electro, downtempo and ambient, all smoothly mixed and properly mastered: Full info, track listing, download links, and even a cue sheet available from my website: https://djbasilisk.com/mixes/esoteric-expanse-4/

Here's a new mix exploring the roots of modern psychedelic techno. It's a period piece set in 2010, hopefully not too recent to arouse a sense of nostalgia for some: Full info and tracklist available on my site: https://djbasilisk.com/mixes/transmissions-from-hyperborea/

I am also active in producing guest mixes for different channels. I'll eventually post this one on my own site, but for now, if you'd like to hear my tribute to Y2K-era French psytrance, techtrance, and progressive, check out the first 80 minutes of this broadcast:

Hello again! It's a new year so I'm starting another thread for fresh mixes. Everything I'm doing these days is carefully curated, properly mastered, and sourced entirely from lossless audio. First up is this Y2K-era progressive mix, but it's not only (or even mainly) progressive psytrance. You'll hear progressive house, progressive trance, and a healthy serving of techno in various forms. As with most of my other long mixes this one builds slowly and has a nice comedown filled with broken beats, IDM, downtempo, and pure ambient. Full info and download links are available on my site: https://djbasilisk.com/mixes/transmissions-from-arcadia/ For reference, here's the thread from last year:

There were outdated and often contained broken links. These days I'd rather self-publish reviews on my own site. I've also learned a lot about music over the years and my taste developed and changed, so it's sometimes a little embarrassing to look at old writing from back in the day, especially during the peak of the "write super long in-depth track-by-track reviews" era

Sorry about the confusion, I swapped domains again; djbasilisk.com will be my homepage moving forward. I haven't made any new entries in the series since 2020 but all future entries will appear here.

From my vantage point there was a bit of a rough patch around 2011 to 2014 or so when there was a lot of low-quality, derivative stuff coming out of this quadrant of the psytrance universe... but the style has definitely bounced back (if indeed there was much of a downturn at all) and Zenon itself continues to set standards and inspire. It takes some effort to sort through what comes out of their release cannon though; they've been extremely prolific and it's hard to keep up with the dizzying number of releases they've been pumping out, to say nothing of the dozens of other labels still probing the depths of this murky dark-light-psychedelic-minimalistic fusion space. Some projects worth checking out 2016 to present: Airi, Amortalist, ETN, Golikem, Gojja, Grouch, Ivort, Nangijala, Pspiralife, Sourone, Triforce, plus old giants like Sensient and Electrypnose (when he dabbles in this field). A few dark selections pulled from my crate: Finally, a palate cleanser, in the form of some good ol' slapbass-infused Zenon style murky morning tunage. There's a ton of great Zenonesque out there... get digging!

I have a new one that might be of some interest to old school Goa trance fans... but it's not Goa trance as we know it today! My idea was to rewind the tape to 1989 and play it forward... but step into another timeline. Full info, track listing, and download links can be found on my site: https://djbasilisk.com/mixes/esoteric-expanse-3/

All three of the previous mixes I posted this summer are now available on my site (as well as my own streaming channels); note that some guest mixes have been renamed: https://djbasilisk.com/mixes/evaporate-32/ https://djbasilisk.com/mixes/silicon-overmind-1/ https://djbasilisk.com/mixes/silicon-overmind-2/

Audio Technica ATH-M50's work pretty well for me and should be available at that price point.

OK, here's the last of the three new mixes launching this month; this one delves into deep house and dub techno territory without any overt psytrance influences whatsoever, but if you're in the mood for something smoothy and dreamy, you'll find it rewards attentive listening.

Here's the second of three expected to land this month... three hours of simmering psychedelic techno with the usual cross-genre tomfoolery:

I have another new mix premiering today, the first of at least three this month. This one starts super chill but goes harder than most of the other recent mixes I've been pumping out. It peaks with some relatively recent tunes by Cybered, Robert Elster (ex-Vibrasphere), Extrawelt, Solid Snake (ex-Tegma), etc., but also dabbles in Zenonesque murkiness and some of that slick Techgnosis vibe. Oh, and you'll hear a soft tune from Benji (Prometheus) near the beginning, so there's definitely a psy connection here... Now available on my site here: https://djbasilisk.com/mixes/silicon-overmind-2/

Sorry about the trouble with download links. I've been receiving sporadic reports that those links don't always work... I'll look into it, but in the meantime, just keep trying Most of the new mixes are pretty time-consuming, but I've got a really solid workflow in place, and I record in multiple sessions when I need to, so it all works out. Composing/arranging/practising is probably the biggest time sink. Editing tracks might take some extra time, depending on what material I decide to use (most of my new mixes contain edits, and some of them require many hours of additional work). Recording goes by relatively quickly; I tend to use the first take rather than recording the same sequence multiple times. Post-production can be pretty arduous, particularly since I'm adjusting the level of compression from track to track in Ableton these days. And then there's all the work involved in completely fleshing out track listings, time-stamping the mix to make cue sheets, cover design, authoring promo text, uploading, promotion and whatever else. And yeah, some old mixes were ret-conned into my work as DJ Basilisk. At some point I decided I rather not bother with multiple identities, different social media accounts, paying for more than one SoundCloud, etc. I'm also trying to make cross-genre experimentation and ambitious mixcrafting my brand rather than saying "this is my psytrance project" and "this is my house/techno project". Maybe it's foolish from a marketing perspective but since I'm not really playing out much anymore I'm inclined to pursue my musical vision without concern for such things.

Esoteric Expanse 2 (formerly Radiant Expanse) is out today! 4+ hours of summer festival sounds, mostly centered on progressive psytrance and progressive house, with onward excursions into midtempo breaks, chill out, and beatless ambient. Tune in and get lost! Full track list and download links available on my site: https://djbasilisk.com/mixes/esoteric-expanse-2/

Sure! I have a bunch of Goa trance sets that I would recommend. This one documents high-intensity night-time psychedelic trance of the late 90s: https://djbasilisk.com/mixes/blacklight-metropolis/ This one is in a similar vein but more technoid: https://djbasilisk.com/mixes/moonshadow/ A unique mix exploring 120 BPM Goa trance and compatible styles: https://djbasilisk.com/mixes/circadian-rhythms/ If you just want to be blasted by a bunch of morning classics: https://djbasilisk.com/mixes/regenerate-2011/

My guest mix for Digital Diamonds is now streaming on my channels: You can also download the mix and read more information on my site: https://djbasilisk.com/mixes/digital-diamonds-podcast-35/ I also un earthed a classic progressive house set I played a couple of years ago... it's nowhere near as polished as the other new mixes I'm posting but might be of some interest. All tracks from 2002 to 2006 or thereabouts: It's also available for download from my site: https://djbasilisk.com/mixes/prototypes-3/

Music is a continuum, and nothing is completely original, so it's difficult to pick one specific track and say "aha, this is the one!" Plenty of candidates exist, depending on how you want to define your criteria and narrow the search. "Goa trance" as a concept didn't really begin to really take on identifiable features until 1993 or 1994 anyway; originally it was an expression that captured quite a range of different yet compatible sounds heard on those halcyon beaches... so really it depends on how you want to approach the question, and how flexible you're willing to be. Some early tunes that have that distinct Goa trance vibe... starting with this new beat classic from 1988: Italian progressive house from 1990... but there's a definite Goa trance vibe with all those eastern melodies: New York techno circa 1990 produced by none other than Joey Beltram... sure sounds like Simon Posford could have taken a cue from this tune tho! Ramin is perhaps best remembered in the Goa trance scene for his work with Afrotrance, but what about this obscure tune from 1990; it is the template for modern-day darkpsy? The first really good Eat Static tune IMO... dating back to 1991 but very rare and hard to get until it was released on Bandcamp more recently: Ever wonder where X-Dream got some of their ideas from? Goa trance fans idolize "The Frog", probably without realizing something very like it was released in 1991... Another one of those tunes that you might say is too far into new beat territory... but this classic from 1991 features plenty of Goa trance tropes (and obviously inspired Etnica): Here's a brilliant and sadly overlooked tune from 1991 that I believe has never been released in full-length, digital quality... produced by Jorg Burger and Wolfgang Voigt (co-founder of Kompakt): Once you step into 1992 the choices begin to proliferate so I'll just leave you with this classic for now... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QA7AM7hmIu8