acid-brain

Agreed, a lot of the early Elysium stuff is fantastic. The album Dance For The Celestial Beings is an absolute classic of the genre. Couldn't care less about any drama the artist is up to these days.

That's really interesting especially as Trance2MoveU also liked the track. The best way I can describe it is that the choice of sounds send me spiralling straight into a "bad trip". I can't appreciate it psychedelically at all because I feel it's going to send me into a dark place. That's caused by the timbre and composition of different sounds rather than the harmonies. And this is coming from a big fan of Xenomorph and other dark goa. Strange. I'm more of a forest-head and I thought this was overall a strong release. I can understand why from one perspective a track like "Betarave" would be seen as lacking direction, or "Pitchbend" would be seen as not developing enough, but the focus in these genres is on different areas (as Anoebis said) and for me they do a better job at bringing me into the trance state than most other stuff out there. And these differences in opinion probably just point to fundamental differences in taste, and as was said above, it's a great thing that Suntrip is putting out different releases to cater to all of us.

Yes it's interesting indeed to see how we have almost the opposite opinion on several of the tracks. I'm guessing with the number of hearts that more people share your opinion. Or they just like your more-to-the-point review style better.

https://suntriprecords.bandcamp.com/album/carpe-noctem 80 minutes of melodic forest and dark goa trance! There's so much detail and variety here, it took me so long to finally write the review. I always feel like I have to listen to every track carefully many times before even sitting down to write, and I guess that's true of every reviewer here, so it's no wonder that it took so long to appear on the review forums. Anyway, this style of tripped-out madness and focus on darker timbres is exactly what I like. So I appreciate Suntrip releasing many darker albums recently. 1. Spindrift - Deeper Reality A new age sample from an Australian yogi kicks us off into a thick and squelchy bassline. At 1:40 a secondary melody appears and complements the bassline well together with all the liquid background noises. The texture of this track is great! At 3:00 there's a mini breakdown then finally the main melody, very catchy and big Indian vibes even for goa. I love the moment at 3:45 where the bassline suddenly comes more to the foreground, together with the reverbing percussive element. A breakdown section leads us eventually to another yogi sample at 5:00. Unfortunately the track starts to lose my interest around this point, there are some additional effects applied to some sounds and Shponglisation of the yogi's voice but overall nothing new in the last few minutes - it could have used another melody or a modulation in the second half. 2. Smuds - Betarave Wonderful mysterious intro leading into a classic "backwards" sounding bassline around the 1 minute mark. At 1:50 things are suddenly switched up with the atmospheric pads getting replaced by hi-hats and flanged shroomy effects. A really weird melody leads us into a bizarre reversed transition at 2:42. Super psychedelic creativity in this track, the whole middle section justs bombards us with novel trippy sound effects, with a mixture of sections sounding wide, echoey, and tripped out, and other sections sounding very tangible and present. 6:25 for instance withdraws a lot of elements that had built up and staggers the lead elements over the bassline in an infectious way. It takes all the way until after 8:30 when first hints of a developed melody are introduced and it's gorgeous, only lasting a small amount of time before the bassline simplifies and brings the track to a strong end. 3. Dragon Twins - Eating Crow Starts off a lot scarier than the previous few tracks, with tense high-pitched leads and a spooky sci-fi atmosphere, plus a punchy kick and deep dark bassline rather than the bouncy foresty ones. Around 1:05 the psy lead sounds a bit more upbeat... a hint of light maybe? But it's just an illusion, the track continues being unsettling. And although it's not very danceable, I'm still excited about what it's building up to. But then at 2:10 the synth sound that comes in is just annoying, and it gets even messier with screaming voices being added. Don't like that at all. The acid in the section starting around 3:35 is really nice, and the new couple minutes would be good if not for the screaming in the background. The track ends with an extremely chaotic climax with several of the previous elements being brought back. Maybe I'm just a wimp but I found this track offputting, with most layers sounding completely wrong, a bad trip (and not the good kind). Perhaps it will appeal to more hardcore listeners. 4. Omnium - Omnipresence "Back to the dark ages". The intro of this track sounds like a ray of light compared to the last, with a really fun bassline cropping up within the first minute and tantalising goa melodies. But at 1:30 it switches to a different bassline altogether that's less interesting than the first one, with tearing sound effects and a lack of anything much going on in the foreground. Finally at 2:45 a melody that reminds me of Mindsphere's early stuff takes centre stage with the tearing and crashing continuing in the background. 4:00 sees the bassline simplify even further and 4:30 is a nice transition, but the track still isn't capturing my attention much. The last minute and a half are the best part since the beginning. Overall I feel this was an awkward attempt to graft forest effects onto melodic goa, and Omnium's Neural Geometry album had several better tracks with a lot more energy than this. 5. Proxeeus - Breaking Down The Barrier Absolutely galloping bassline that reminds me of Hallucinogen Horses, with echoey drums and vague foresty noises. At 1:30 the shroom gnomes start dancing their melody. Around 3:00 there's a breakdown and a nicely-tuned 303 gives us something to grasp on to, and at 4:10 enters a dissonant scratchy loop which opens up into a beautiful wide psy synth 4:45. From 5:45 there's an extended break down, starting off with some nice percussion and some quieter melodies. This part of the track is unexpected and just outstanding, giving space for an absolute belter of a psychedelic crescendo to start mounting at 7:40. What a journey, the highlight of the album for me and it's hard to imagine many other tracks released in 2021 can match the energy and pacing of this one. It has momentum, focus, and structure which none of the previous tracks so far can touch. 6. Xenomorph - Lost In An Old Junkyard Xenomorph is one of my favourite artists and almost the only one still producing 10/10 work today, so I eagerly anticipate any new tracks released by him. Dying Sun was the best composition on the Gamma Draconis release but unfortunately poorly mastered for some reason, so thankfully there is not the same issue here. After a typical creepy start with whispering voices, we get a haunting melody, dripping sounds and a chugging bass. Around 2:20 the melody is super rhythmic, and transitions into deeper and deeper psychedelica, until around 4:10 suddenly rolls back to the melancholic beginning sounds again. At 5:00 there's a high-tech chorus building up into a nice change into a new melody at 5:45 and bouncy alien voices. It again goes deeper and deeper before slowly rolling down. Overall while this track was very psychedelic, it wasn't as coherent as Dying Sun and lacked some truly standout elements. Still solid work though. 7. Ka-Sol - Dance Of The Locusts Weird UFO-like noises kick this off and after 1:00 it slowly builds up into a crunchy in your-face multi-layered muddy bassline that Ka-Sol likes to use. I really don't have much to say about this track, it's too repetitive and runs out of ideas quickly, and is far from Ka-Sol's best. 8. Battle of the Future Buddhas - Pitchbend Title of this one doesn't lie as it immediately starts with a dramatic sounds that gets pitch bent up and down. Very squelchy acid low-end is slowly introduced and takes the fore after 1:30 and remains throughout most of the track. Spooky synth wails at 2:00! A trademark BOFB melody kicks in, and at moments I'm reminded of the classic first album Twin Sharkfins. At 3:50 there's a Blade Runner sample, which is a bit unexpected since that movie (especially that character) is a cliche as far as samples go. Anyway, around 4:25 there's a slight switch as the bassline suddenly starts walking downwards heavily at the end of each 4 bars. From 5:00-6:00 the track loses my interest a bit due to a lack of tonal variation / standout lead elements, so it's good that at 6:00 we get a melody that really emphasises the thumping bassline. The climax starts building with a beautiful colourful arpeggio, soon joined by the original pitch bent sound. Suddenly the low end drops away, replaced by a resonant synth. What a spine-tingling ending! 9. L.A.B. - Spellbound (Hada Remix) I don't remember hearing any tracks from this artist before, checking Discogs I may have heard him on Schlabbaduerst 005. Then I realised that this is actually Hada's reinterpretation of L.A.B.'s classic track. Starts off with an explosive burp and then a melody that's reminiscent of Israeli upbeat goa but with scary high-pitch sound effects in the background. At 1:00 the melody tone suddenly changes from a lead to some silly wailing sound, how funny! At 1:30 it changes once again to a more flowing foresty synth that really complements the tight bassline. Around 2:00 there's an even more upbeat sounding melody that to be honest is nice to hear after so many tracks without such a thing. Around 3:00 the buildup has just been sublime and I am dancing and grinning like a madman! 3:20 has another cheeky breakdown with laughter. It's playful and great up until 5:10 where there's a key change that's not executed super well imo, but it recovers when the brilliant Power Source-like melody kicks back in at 6:00. The last minute and a half break-down is well done. This track was a fantastic blend of more goa like melodies with forest with many twists and turns. I just listened to the original track and much prefer this interpretation. 10. JaraLuca - Flashbacks Really strong intro here with a resonant bassline and off-beat kick. Quite refreshing to hear some different kick patterns after so much four-to-the-floor. From the start until 2:20 it grows into an absolutely savage brain-melting acid climax. Then transitions into a more developed 303 melody, with a big atmosphere that keeps the tension building as the frequency knob on the 303 is slowly released. At 3:50 the next changeup comes, sadly the melody here is a little lame. The wide rhythmic synths at 4:55 are wonderful. Soon after 5:20 the killer acid lines are back. They don't match the intensity of the initial buildup, and it feels like some potential was wasted in this track for the second climax. Never mind, the intensity of the first few minutes made up for it. Overall this track appears slightly out of place on this album, being heavy and industrial rather than more subtle/deep and forest-like, but it pulls it off nicely. Favourites: 2, 5(!), 6, 8, 9(!), 10

Apologies at bumping my own thread, but I also wonder whether Xenomorph's many VA singles will ever see re-release. There's some great work there, "Bizarre Temporary Dissociation" for instance which is better than any track on his Qlippoth album (imo) and was only released on one relatively obscure compilation!

The YouTube algorithm has a tendency to promote certain trending videos and make them appear on everyone's sidebar who is interested in even remotely similar stuff. Likely that's what happened to the Astrix song. But yes, psytrance is way more popular than goa, people just don't seem to talk about it so much on independent forums. I disagree that goa trance is "bound to die", that's what people said in the early 2000s and still new people are interested in listening to it. Cosmosis track with 1.2m views:

https://singularityhub.com/2021/01/10/the-worlds-oldest-story-astronomers-say-global-myths-about-seven-sisters-stars-may-reach-back-100000-years/ The Pleiades, also known as the Seven Sisters: > It is among the star clusters nearest to Earth... and is the cluster most obvious to the naked eye in the night sky. Only six stars in the cluster are visible to the naked eye yet mythology from several ancient cultures share the idea that one of the seven “sisters" is hidden. These two stars now appear as one to the naked eye which the author proposes is the source of the hidden sister. This dates the story to 100,000 years ago.

Agreed I have enjoyed those tracks and those releases very much. I want to write a review of Carpe Noctem soon as it's a real treat for fans of the darker side of goa / forest psy / Schlabbaduerst sound. Xenomorph has grown a lot on me over time, perhaps it's because he's never watered down or compromised his sound. Or perhaps because I really got into horror movies and literature. It gives you a thrill you don't get from other genres! Or I just learned to appreciate good production better these days. Even his earliest release Obscure Spectre / Telepathic Combat while obviously sounding dated still has a really well balanced and developed soundscape, the tracks are always twisting forwards and drawing you into Xenomorph's demented world. From ZNA Gathering I really like "Sinister Contours", which appears to have more of a tech-trance progression, which I appreciate a lot for its hypnotic / meditative qualities (although I know not everyone does). At 13:33 it feels like a huge break is coming with a bassline flourish, but all it adds is a snare - you can see from the video how much Xenomorph enjoys unleashing the understated break which caught me by surprise as it's not typical for his music. Looks like Agneton lighting a cigarette in the foreground but probably not him lol. Then at 14:30 I'm not really sure how to describe what happens but it's wonderful, there's a transition that shuffles the sounds around and then a high-pitched goa-esque melody kicks in to finally fill up the high-end.

Xenomorph played a fantastic set at ZNA Gathering 2019 featured a lot of new tracks that are supposed to be part of a 2020 album. Also there were some really nice unreleased tracks that should have been released (check out "Lilith" at 18:55)

Please create a 2021 subforum for reviews.

It's a long mix but a good thing I'm working from home these days and have all day to listen to it. I'm looking forward to giving it a spin and will let you know how I feel afterwards!

What are your favourite tracks from this album? The awesome thing about this album is how the tracks are diverse and different. But my favourite two are definitely the last two, especially "Chosen By The Gods", which has those dirty Asia 2001 vibes.

@Ormion have you revised your opinion? I have the opposite viewpoints, this is easily one of my favourite melodic goa releases from Suntrip and the whole last decade in general.

As a relative youngling and goa newcomer who only discovered the genre slightly over 10 years ago, everything that was said above rings true. Sandman - Witchcraft is an excellent choice for an album that sounds more fresh and engaging than other goa releases. Most of the other albums that caught my ear in a similar way are probably better classified as psy: Pigs In Space, Koxbox Dragon Tales, COP, late 90's X-Dream. A track like "Fairy in The Dragonforest" sounds like a more evolved version of classic goa trance, with much better rhythm section! Ultimately it leads to a debate into exactly where "old school goa" ends and psy begins, and nobody wants another one of those. A lot of stuff that gets rave reviews here, took me years to understand because of the dated production. Early Juno Reactor, Etnica, Koxbox - Forever After (especially compared to Dragon Tales). Over time I've come to appreciate it all, it just took perseverance. And then there's the stuff that just sounds "of it's time". While I enjoy MWNN or Power Source's tracks for instance, most of them really do sound like mid-90's trance hits. Which seems like a dumb thing to say, because that's exactly what they are, but compare to a track like Tandu's Alien Pump or Sandman's G-Force and there's no contest. Somehow, there's a small number of goa tracks that just stand out as electrifying today, and when I play them to my electronic music loving friends, they can't believe the date they were created.