The Best Psychedelic Trance I've heard
Psychedelic Trance (Psytrance or just Psy for short) is Goa Trance's successor. It is more techish, and mechanical and its most prominent element is the bassline, which basically is a series of continous bass notes going "RRRR" that impart a real drive to the track. My favourite description of Psy trance is "spiritual underground, 140+bpm uptempo climaxes, strongintelligentalien, sharprobotsapiens, huge old future, full-on-all-in-one, colourful brain activity inducing" taken from here.
Here is a map of all the sub genres of psy and goa trance by Anoebis of Psynews. It was originally posted here. You can't see the whole thing properly so try saving the file and viewing it in whatever image viewing software you use.
Psychedelic trance started around '98, and some pinpoint its beginning at the release of X-Dream's Radio. Along with the morph into Psy, the number of producers and sub-genres simply exploded, and huge amounts of psy are released every year. While there is lots of good psytrance out there, it gets lost in the mediocre stuff, as some producers headed off into a more commercial direction, using cliched sounds and formulas to get more mainstream appeal.
I've haven't heard that much psy which is why its called "Best Psy I've Heard". A lot of exploring needs to be done, particularly the minimal side, so some sub-genres are under-represented in this list. And I don't take to progressive psy because it just doesn't sound psychedelic enough! Ofcourse, this list will be nowhere near the quality of my Goa list, but then there are no other psy lists on Listology.
Albums
Androcell - Efflorescence - 2006 - Psybient, Dub
Alien Mental - Mind Hack - 2007 - Dark
Central Processing Unit - Central Processing Unit - 2003 - Full-on
Capsula - The Synthesis of Reality - 2005 - Psybient
(The) Delta - Scizoeffective - 1999 - Horror/Tech
Derango - Tumult - 2005 - Dark/Forest-ey
This is dark trance. Gnomes, trolls and leprechauns will whisper in your head, and whisk you off to the depths of the Scandinavian forests.
Distant System - Spiral Empire - 2008 - Ambient
The same person is behind this and Androcell.
Deviant Electronics - Blunt Instruments - 2000 - Drum & Bass,Ambient
Nice, chillout psy breaks.
Domi Pastor - Immmortality - 2002 - Goa/Dark varies from track to track
The second track has such an amazing melody in the beginning, just a simple melody with a kick and it leaves you stunned, the track is very aptly titled "The Fly of the Pheonix".
Entheogenic - Entheogenic - 2002 - Psybient
Electrypnose - Subliminimal Melancholies - 2006 - Psybient
Fractal Glider - Parasite - 2002 - meld of goa/psy
Furious - Uncanny Beats - 2007 - Maximal Dark
Absolutely crazy Russian psy, with a new effect every few seconds, this will max out your senses in out trying to take in what you're hearing.
Hallucinogen - The Lone Deranger - 1997
Not as good as the debut, but I still think it merits a place here.
Infected Mushroom - The Gathering - 1999 - Melodic
IM were really good in the beginning, but now apparently they play rock covers. No comments.
Jikkenteki - The Long Walk Home - 2006 - Experimental
Free legal download from Ektoplazm.
Ghreg on Earth - Sigilweaver - 2005 - Dark with Goth, Metal influences
This is very intense darkpsy, so be prepared.
Growling Mad Scientists - No Rules - 2002 - Full-On
Balances quality and appeal, and contains the famous "Juice" track.
Koxbox - Dragon Tales - 1997 - Experimental
Looking at the cover art itself will make you trip, let alone listening to this album.
Ocelot - Vector Selector - 2007 - Night Full-on
Phutureprimitive - Sub Conscious - 2004 - Dub,Tribal,Downtempo
Principles of Flight - Night Time Lullabies - 2006 - Experimental
Principles of Flight - Chaos Opera - 2009 - Twilight/Night Full-On
Saiko-Pod - Phutures and Options - 2002 - Progressive Trance
I don't normally like prog because its too watered down, but I did like this one.
Sandman - Witchcraft - 1998 - Experimental
The start of the first track itself should be enough to convince you that this is something out of the ordinary.
Shakta - Feed the Flame - 2004
Shpongle - Tales of the Inexpressible - 2001 - Star Shpongled Banner, Dorset Perception, Flute Fruit - Psybient
If this album doesn't get your friends interested in trance, nothing will.
Space Tribe - Thru the Looking Glass - 2005 - Full-on
Fast paced full-on with generous dollops of acid!
Talpa - The Art of Being Non - 2004 - meld of goa & psy
Ubar Tmar - Macrometasomakosmos - 2002 - Experimental,Avant Garde
An amazing piece of work, definitely avant garde, and a real journey through different moods and shades of psy.
Yahel - Waves of Sound - 2000 - Melodic,proggy
X-Dream - Radio - 1998 - Psytrance
VA - Schizm - 2004 - Funky/Groovy
VA - Yggdrasounds - 2008 - Dark
Tracks
Acidrockers - Inside
DnB from the comp Freekstyle which is essentially a Psy Breaks/DnB comp.
Cosma - Simplicity
Many people simply love his 2 albums, but I didn't see that much in them. There are definitely some good tracks though. Sadly, Cosma passed away in a motorcycle accident before his second album was released =\
Crazy Ducks - Bulka
Cosmosis - Samba Del Gringo (Samba Psy? :p)
Cosmosis - The Eternal Now (Full-On)
Darshan - Speed Freak
Initially I liked this because of that acid part in the middle, then on repeated listens I thought the rest of the track was pretty deep, it sort of grew on me.
Encephalopaticys - Foksi's Insomnia
ESP - Pozitronic Brain
Four Carry Nuts - Red Shift
Front Line Assembly - Evil Playground (Chainsaw Mix)
Remix by Tim Schuldt in his inimitable hard, dark style
Infected Mushroom & GMS - Arabian Nights on Mescaline
Mandalavandalz - Irina
Misted Muppet - Machine Forest
Misted Muppet - Innocence
Nystagmus - Tommy Is Dead
From the Immaculate Perception album, which I found to be rather patchy. Frequently, the track is doing great, and then in comes a guitar at the most inopportune moment =(
Planum - Elaborate
Rinkadink - Cabbage Al La Tetradink (Dark)
Rinkadink - Stampede (Dark)
Sine Die - Life Hack
Shift - Kapitol (Dark Full-on)
This track has some beautiful dark pads
X-Dream - The 1st
Awesome track, the perfect Terminator soundtrack. An amazing atmosphere with some good synth work and perfectly distorted cyborg vocals.
Void - Junky
Time for some fun, humourous takes on KILLA URNSLD ESKIMO SKZI IM FULL ON if you know what I mean :p
http://www.myspace.com/babasystem
http://www.myspace.com/daggiandthesnarerolls
This is an extremely helpful list, thank you so much for taking the time to make this. I can't stop listening to Ghreg On Earth.
Nice! You like dark psy. I really didn't expect anyone to get into it, because its so far removed from mainstream trance. Sigilweaver is like goth/industrial influenced psy. Generally dark psy is a lot faster, and more chaotic with really fast notes. There is plenty of more darkpsy out there....
Psynews thread on darkpsy.
Some albums you can try if you feel like exploring further...
Dark Soho - Combustion
Four Carry Nuts - Mechanical Age
Psykovsky - Debut
Kindzadza - Waves from Outer Space
Rinkadink - Rabbit from Darkside
Furious - Uncanny Beats
Uncanny Beats is a completely different type of darkpsy from Sigilweaver, its the really fast 170 BPM-ish stuff. There is also the forest trance type of darkpsy like Derango and Haltya.
I hope some of these suggestions prove useful ;)
Thanks! I'll make sure to check them out and let you know what I think =D
So I was listening to your Alien Machinations song just now and I tripped like I never have before. I was sitting at my computer and all of a sudden i could have sworn that my entire room just went sideways. I blinked about 5 times and it was still sideways. I finally took a deep breath and closed them for about 10 seconds and everything went back to normal. I have never tripped like that before (especially when I'm not on something).
Good job! =P
Thanks =) Lol, wow thats something I definitely haven't heard before. I've never tripped like that though, I mean nothing physical has happened like things changing, but on the best tracks its like every neuron in my brain is ready to fire! Looks like trance is really your thing. Check out Fever Dream too then, I'd say its trippier.
please temme where i can download these rare psy tracks..cant find em..
ty..
Free from Soulseek or DC++, or you can buy from Saiko Sounds
hey man!! i found this page searching for music....this is just awesome you know a lot of psy....i wanna ask you some thigs: what genre is distant system, the delta, androcell, battle of the future buddhas, domi pastor and haltya ???? i've never heard of this ones....can you add me or give me your msn?? i will be very happy. mine is alpuche27@hotmail.com hope we can talk of music
Distant Sytem - Spiral Empire - Ambient
Androcell - Efflorescence - Ambient
The Delta - Scizoeffective - Dark Psy
Battle of the Future Buddhas - Twin Sharkfins - Forest Goa
Domi Pastor - Immortality - A mix of styles, starts off with Goa melodies, ends on a dark full-on note.
Haltya - Forest Psy
Derango - Tumult...
listening to it now... utterly AMAZING!
One of my favorite psy albums is Phutureprimitive - Sub Conscious
Its a nice album, added :) Thing is, how do you evaluate psybient? Put Sub Conscious and something like Tumult side by side and its really difficult to compare the two. Tumult is real psychedelic while Sub Conscious is the opposite, its chillout. Besides, ambient can sound similar, for me Ott's Blumenkraft is a good example of perfect production and nothing else (which is why its not on the list). Ultimately how psychedelic is psybient?
I guess I see what you are getting at, and I admit it would be a stretch to call Blumencraft psy, although it has a psy influence. It clearly has some songs that have about zero psy in them. Putting that aside, I do really enjoy that album, but not a 'psy' album.
Perhaps only the ear can pass judgment on psybient as being 'psy'. I am a bit suprised Shpongle (tribal psybient) is not on this list.
Oh yeah I have to give Shpongle a listen.
Didn't you feel Blumenkraft was basically just good production and that it sounds similar to other dub albums? Imo it didn't bring anything new with it. I could listen to it for a bit, but not the whole album.
I think I'm going to split this list into Uptempo and Downtempo, that seems to be the sensible thing to do.
hey man...being relatively nw to psy trance music havnt heard all f dem frm ur list so still gt a lot f catchng up to do....anyways wld lyk to share watvr little knwldge i hv bout da music n wld lyk u to correct me if m wrng
among all da sub genres f dis music
FULL ON-more mainstream n represented by artists lyk astrix,GMS,Indra,alien project
NIGHT-artists lyk phatmatix,absolum,space tribe
DARK PSY-pskovsky,electrypnose,kindzadza
are dere ny other sub genres m missing
in wat kind of sound YGGDRASOUNDS will fit into
thnx n waiting fr ur input
Space Tribe isn't night imo, its full-on. Ocelot - Vector Selector is more like night.
For all the genres in psytrance, simply have a look at that big image put up at the beginning of this article. It pretty much covers everything. In short we have...
Uplifting (Ziki - Eliminator)
Ambient/Chill (Androcell/Solar Fields)
Full-on (GMS,Eskimo)
Dark (Hux Flux - Reboot,Ghreg on Earth - Sigilweaver)
Night(Ocelot)- I guess you may not differentiate between dark and night, but if you insist on sub-genrefying...here's night for you.
Breaks (Digitalis 2nd CD on Shakta's Feed the Flame,Deviant Electronics - Blunt Instruments)
Tribal (The Nommos)
Minimal (Human Blue - Ice,Shiva Chandra - Auricular)
Proggressive (Astrix)
Stuff thats just acidic and psychedelic (Hallucinogen - The Lone Deranger,Fractal Glider - Parasite)
Melodic or goa-ish(IM-the gathering,Talpa - The Art of Being Non)
Tech-ish stuff (Spirillianz,later X-Dream)
Forest (Haltya)
Yggdrasounds would be dark.
so wat bout phatmatix n absolum...arent dey nght?
I've only heard Absolum's Inside the Sphere and its full-on, full of energy and driving. I haven't heard any Phatmatix so I have no idea about them.
Infected Mushroom's "Bust a Move" is a great track... insanely melodic and epically intense. My only gripe is the somewhat lame vocal sample.
I have yet to listen to Dragon Tales, but I recommend Koxbox's Forever After, especially "Tribal Oscillation".
Vocals are the path to mainstream fame (and guitars lest we forget) and IM discovered and adapted. Check out Cities of the Future and I Wish for more vocals though they're not all that bad. Early IM output is fairly good.
Koxbox is great. Check out Psychopod which is an alias. They released an EP with two tracks - Psychopod and Dreampod. Both tracks are good stuff.
You checked out the new Cosmosis album yet? Fumbling for the Funky Frequency : really nice old school stlye Cosmosis. One of his best recent efforts imo. I'd also recommend any of Mr Peculiar's 3 albums. Huge open sounds with lush melodies
I'm sorry about the late reply. I did give Synergy and Fumbling for the Funky Frequency a listen. The latter had some good tracks, I added Samba Del Gringo because it sounded fresh and The Eternal Now. Synergy I thought was average. It had melodies but they were the standard goa leads. And the bass/kicks were subdued, which wasn't to my taste.
Which is the best Mr. Peculiar album? I tried out Mind-Dala, the sounds were fairly standard full-on synths over a bassline. Brainsnake stood out a bit. For full-on I prefer CPU, Space Tribe and early GMS. Their tracks are 'fuller' and more interesting.