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tangentially related/unrelated, it would be sweet to get a 12" of Apex, Open Sea, and Roma (the three tracks from Blue Planet that weren't included on the vinyl release of that album). Again, not really related, but the topic made me think of it 😃 ❤️

Vaporized Human Odyssey 2023 Digital Reprints Human Odyssey 1 1-1Vaporized (2)–Return To The Source 12:51 1-2Vaporized (2)–Circle Of Dust 11:21 1-3Vaporized (2)–Solar Cycles 10:38 1-4Vaporized (2)–Human Odyssey 9:44 1-5Vaporized (2)–Full Moon 9:44 1-6Vaporized (2)–Silverbox 10:54 1-7Vaporized (2)–Enter The Circle 10:37 Human Odyssey 2 2-1Vaporized (2)–Return To The Source (Dig Deeper Mix) 12:51 2-2Vaporized (2)–Circle Of Dust (Red Rock Mix) 10:36 2-3Vaporized (2)–Solar Cycles (In Orbit Mix) 11:03 2-4Vaporized (2)–Red Dust 10:22 2-5Vaporized (2)–Silverbox (Acid Mix) 9:47E 2-6Kristian* & DJ Cosmix–The Vision (Vaporized Remix) 10:00 2-7Vaporized (2)–Artifact 12:22 This is a fascinating double album released in 2023 by Danish artist Kristian Thinning Andersen. He is most famous as Elysium, though he has a variety of other monikers. Andersen made some of the greatest Goa tracks ever in the 90s with a unique mellow, tribal, and hypnotic style. One of my personal favourites is the Sheyba ep on Flying Rhino from 1995: Who can forget the wolf howls in "Ancient Lands" which take the listener deep into the ancestral past. Other notable releases include Spiritual's "Ride the Snake", Kaaya's "Ormazd", Kailash's "Higher", and the two Elyzium albums Dance for the Celestial Beings (1995) and Celestial Sounds and Neurotic Tribal Beats (1997). Evocative, storytelling stuff, more for the inner journey than for 'aving it on the dancefloor, though plenty potent on the dancefloor too. Rather than give a track by track formalist description, I want to try to sum up Andersen's artistic goal and the feel of his tunes, with which I'm sure many of you are familiar. Perhaps the most important thing then is to point out that if you are a fan of his work, as I am, then this is a must. Andersen has not changed his style. This is not to say that he is stuck or lacks variety or experiment or is narrow, but he simply has his own unique style that is instantly recognisable. And what a style it is - poised hovering in the liminal zone between the dancefloor and the chill out area with bpms seldom getting up into the 140s, its distinctive feature is hypnosis. In a sense, then, his music is the very essence of trance, which is a hypnotic state, a state of immersion if you will. There's a deep calm in his music, that is quite different to the ecstatic excitement, even freneticism, of a lot of trance and psytrance. It is more of a highlands plateau than the peaks and valleys of psytrance. It is likely that the Dionysian among us will not like this calm and will find this album boring. If you want high drama, crushing rhythms, major chords, frenzied build-ups, hardcore blastoff, then look elsewhere. For those who can enter this calm state, it provides the meditative bliss of relaxation and acceptance. This music creates the atmosphere in which it is best appreciated. Here are the words of the man himself: "I wanted to return to the way I think trance should be like. To me, trance is a slowly building journey on the dance floor by its hypnotizing patterns and deep soundscapes. Repetitively rhythmic to put you in a state of trance." Andersen emphasises his return to proto-Goa, which was slower and lacked the build-ups and galloping horse basslines of post-millenial psytrance. What I most appreciate about this relaxation is that it tends to grant the space for the mind to expand into fantasy - it is quite easy to be swept to far-off lands with these tunes. This does not mean that Vaporized lacks intensity. Intensity may be provided by tribal vibes through vocals, samples, percussion. Whilst I do miss the tribal vibes a bit on this latest album, they are still there in the background. Intensity is also provided by the microdynamics of texture and small changes. A master of texture, Andersen was always good at making sounds that ranged from silken smooth to ragged ripping. Many of his sounds, showcased by the relatively constant rotating polyrhythms in the background have more pixels per nanosecond than there are motes of dust in the Sahara (though you will need a good hifi to hear this). Part of the sonic magic is the recordings and masterings: no compression wars here and sounds have space to breathe, do not blur together, dynamics are free. I checked out my vinyl and cds and the only information on the mastering I could find was "Prodam" and "Podam" - I searched but nothing came up. This is also true of this new work, which is also well produced. This high quality recording and mastering pays off in psychoactive sound with good micro as well as macro dynamics. This is crucial to Andersen because he is very good at small changes, subtle shifts of delicate percussion, unexpected time wobbles - small changes amidst heavy repetition that can tug at your ear, especially when you are in the calm and receptive state of trance. There, in a nutshell, I think you have the spirit of Elysium/Vaporized: hypnotic trance. It is relatively introspective stuff that eschews drama, performativity, grandiosity, hysteria, going instead for meditative calm. This, of course, does not mean that the artist is always so calm himself. Hypnosis is also invariably haunted by the image of the zombie: who is controlling the hypnotised is the question that typically arises. Is it a corporate AI? Perhaps it is the Soviet nostalgia hackers? No, it is definitely the aliens described by Cixin Liu. Whether you are concerned about being hypnotised or not, the questions that have historically accompanied the inner path do flutter about this introspective art. Of course, this means that this is more home music than for the main floor. If hypnotic trance sounds appealing to you, then you won't do better than this excellent album and the stunning back catalogue behind it. ~*~

And people wonder why this forum going downhill, this is a review thread, keep it that way

One of the few decent mastered goa trance releases of this century, something that hasn't been done since then. Don't expect any smashed and limited goa trance in here, everything sounds splendid and respectful to the dynamic music which BPC made in the past. I wonder what's the story behind this? Together with a fantastic tracklist, varied in a way, this makes it a release for every goa trance addict and audiophiles as well.

Seems like Draeke covered most of my thoughts. But anyway, here it comes anyway: Dear on10 I have no idea of who you are, how long you have listened to psychedelic trance or how long you have been ”in the scene”, but I felt like explaining a couple of things after reading your review. It’s not meant to make any conflict or bad feelings, just a try for an explanation, because it seems to me like there are a few things you haven’t realized/understood in this case. First of all, the music. For those of us who have followed the trance scene from the early beginning, we know where it comes from. We know who the pioneers were who started all this. Everything that came after this, you can thank these pioneers for. It has grown naturally from what they started, long before everybody could make a trance track in one day. These were true artists creating something new, never done before, and creating a classic trance track wasn’t done in one day back then…. Back then, there wasn’t any clear difference between the various categories of trance. All these terms, such as hard trance, full on, progressive, Goa etc. came later… Blue Planet Corporation was one of these pioneers and one of the first ones to explore psychedelic elements in hypnotic trance music. Endless of artists after him picked up inspiration from his music. These tracks are extremely hard to find today. You have to be rich to get hold of any of the vinyl releases on UFK. Unlike you, there are a lot of people out there who where there in the early beginning, and yes, we have nostalgic memories from back then. Many of these people also have a nostalgic feeling about having the physical copy in their position. We are not grown up with finding everything on the net… For us, the early trance from the pioneers, such as BPC, is important musical history! Our way of documenting musical history for the future, is by releasing something like this. Like a history book you can find in the library, this album is a history, an important history that means a lot to many of us, that we document by creating this release for those who cares (where it all started, where it comes from, how it sounded back then etc.). Which brings me over to another point I wanted to tell you about regarding your review; Respect is one of the words that often come to mind when I think about the trance scene. Respect other human beings, the people that you celebrate life together with, the celebration of trance and dance. One of the important words in the scene of peace, love, unity and respect. This is something that used to be very important in the scene from the beginning and many years after it all started. This might have faded a bit away by the years. The entire scene has changed drastically since the 90s, and ended up obviously pretty far away from how it used to be. Everybody is offcourse entitled to have their own taste in music. No one is forcing you to like this peace of history, but the word respect for other human beings is something I strongly think should remain in the scene, even though I don’t personally participate in the scene much anymore. Several of the sentences and words you use in your review totally show that you have missed some important factors in the scene. Telling people to pirate download this music is just one example where you obviously pay no attention to my words above, P.L.U.R., the main key in the trance scene. Writing something like that has nothing to do in a music review, simple as that. It’s no problem for any of us that you dislike the beginning of psychedelic trance, but when you write a review, I would suggest to check some background information before writing insulting, punching words to people who use a lot of their money, time and energy to create a piece of musical history for the generations to come. Thinking that this project will lead to extra income is as far away from the truth as it can possibly get. Gabriel who made the music and Draeke who released it on his important history learning label is true music lovers who NEVER had money in their mind when deciding to release it! So, on10. I have to underline that I don’t write all this to insult, create harm or any kind of conflict. I wrote this to you because I hope you will realize a bit more why projects like this are being done and that you maybe could think twice next time you want to write a review. So let’s keep it a bit friendly around here, write our opinions without insulting and hurting each other. And hands up to all of you who understand what it’s all about. Never forget the 90’s and where you came from. PKS