abasio

I have fallen in love with TCR - Falling Into The Sky

Did you hear Scorb's debut? That was class

Another spambot on the loose jurdreda sent me a message "From Administrator" "Important New Forum Rules" As we all know most site admin have zero posts and a weird nick you've never heard before How are they getting in? We did so well for so long and now they are rampant

So what you are basically trying tosay is that if people don't have the same taste as you it's because they have not yet aquired it? So you hate Britney Spears? Maybe you haven't listened to her deeply enough. I am sure there are millions of people who love her music, they have aquired the taste. I am not keen on your mushroom analogy as it sounds like you hated mushrooms but were made to eat them for 15 years and you have simply gotten used to them. But at the end of the day you are still putting a fungus in your mouth I agree that somethings can take time to appreciate but many people have been saying that they used to love Shpongle but that it didn't hold their attention long enough. Do you think these people just haven't aquired the taste? They had it then lost and all they need is to listen to it more & more and they will love it again? Also, wrong example to convince me using Mozart. No matter how many times I listen to Mozart I just cannot like it even if I can respect it. If you listened to other composers more closely though you might see the shallowness of Mozart's simple childish music (IMO ) Now remember that I in fact love Shpongle & I do still listen to AYS? a lot but I can still see why people don't like it. There are some cheesy samples in it Remember that your taste (aquired or not) is not the be all and end all of all things. Just because you think that something is the most amazing art you have ever heard it doesn't make it a fact that it is. Mozart, Shpongle, Pink Floyd or the Beatles it doesn't matter, it is all subjective as it is people who say it is good or bad. We can't put music into a mathematical formula to see if it's good or bad we just have to have our own opinion. You need to allow people to disagree!

Artist: Hallucinogen Title: Twisted Label: Dragonfly Records (Re-released on Twisted Records) Released: 16th October 1995 Style: Psychedelic Trance Tracklist 1. LSD (6:43) 2. Orphic Thrench (7:22) 3. Alpha Centauri (10:16) 4. Dark Magus (7:31) 5. Shamanix (9:59) 6. Snarling Black Mabel (7:45) 7. Fluoro Neuro Sponge (6:41) 8. Solstice (8:06) 9. Angelic Particles (Remix) (3:40) “I believe that with the advent of acid we have discovered a new way to think, and it had to do with piecing together new thoughts in your mind. Why is it that people think it’s so evil? What is it about it that scares people so deeply? Even the guy that invented it What is it? Because they’re afraid that there’s more to reality than they have in front of them that there are doors that they’re afraid to go in and they don’t want us to go in either because if we go in we might learn something that they don’t know and that makes us a little out of their control.” The opening sample to LSD on Hallucinogen’s debut album Twisted is an amazing verbal representation of the music. Replace the drug LSD with this album & it still fits. Twisted is like a psychedelic drug, it opens new doors showing us that there is more to reality than we see right in front of us. Listening to music can have a profound effect on the brain that I believe Simon Posford managed to show way back in 1995 with his seminal release Twisted on Dragonfly Records. Long considered to be a classic in psychedelic trance Twisted is well deserved in the praise it receives. The whole album is full of wonderful melodies never getting into the levels of cheese that regular trance often flirts with. There are a few cheesy moments in the album, for example the end of Shamanix, but they are always on the acceptable side they are fun and not the sort that is going to make you groan. Under these melodies is a plethora of psychedelic sounds, well layered samples and a 4-4 rhythm that while not overly fast gives an energy that could make you dance for hours on end with just the music to support you. I first discovered this album shortly after it was released in 1995 and I was instantly blown away. From the extremely trippy melodies in LSD to the excellent synth work in Orphic Trench and Alpha Centauri as well as some spacey atmospheres with bright colourful sounds, the tight simplicity of Dark Magus or the fun if slightly cheesy sound of Shamanix. The dirtiness of Snarling Black Mabel, the insane amount of layers built up in Fluoro Neuro Sponge and the beautiful melodic voices screaming from another dimension in Solstice this album is between great and amazing in every second of music, even the ambient version of Angelic Particles at the end is spine tinglingly good. Nearly a decade and a half later I still listen to this album regularly & each time I listen to it I am still blown away by just how amazing the music is. For me this is the most psychedelic upbeat album I have listened to and it is indeed a classic in the genre and Simon Posford’s greatest achievement in trance music. The only thing I’d like to see different is possibly the order of the tracks, I’d probably put Shamanix at the end with Snarling Black Mabel nearer the beginning along with LSD and Dark Magus. All in all though this album is a must have for any fan of Psychedelic trance. The re-release on Twisted Records is still readily available at their website so there really is no excuse not to have this milestone in electronic music. Track By Track 1. LSD LSD opens with a sample describing the drug LSD and people’s fear of it, a profound statement probably a little over the top for a drug that basically tricks the brain into thinking it is experiencing something profound. The sample though is very thought provoking when considering the music as the music is a real and natural experience while still having the same effects. The whole track is wonderful from start to finish with a great leading melody, energetic but non dominating beats and a lot of trippy sounds. There are a few too many LSD samples in the middle that I could do without but overall it’s a great track. 2. Orphic Trench For me Orphic Trench is all about the synth line. It still has wonderful melodies, trippy noises and a great rhythm but the synths in this track just raise the bar. As I listen to it I feel like my head is being lifted higher and higher why staying exactly in the same place. Imagine sitting in your living room as your mind soars high over the world totally detached from your body but you are still one and the same entity. You can see both realities at the same time, the mundane & the divine but they merge together so it is difficult to know which is which. This is wonderful music. 3. Alpha Centauri Alpha Centauri is a great mix of the elements of the first to tracks. Wonderful melodies and amazing synth work but instead of overlapping they make way for each other as if knowing that each should be experienced fully. The effect is a very psychedelic track that has spacey atmospheres with bright colours and feels like I am rushing through hyperspace with the walls of reality vibrating on every side impossibly close yet infinitely distant. The dimensions twist and turn and if you try and concentrate on one specific point your mind might be torn apart. Step back view everything with an open mind from a distance & let the unreality of everything wash over you. 4. Dark Magus This track feels tighter, whereas the preceding three felt they were wide open spaces with infinite possibilities in the landscape and beyond the horizon, Dark Magus feels like it is an infinitesimally small point crammed with all the information & emotion of a much larger entity. Like a singularity with extreme mass but no dimensions, as with the preceding track, thinking too much about it is not what is needed. Simple acceptance of what is difficult to comprehend is the only way to understanding the tight complex music. More wonderful synths, simple hypnotising melodies & not so much energy as before but still enough to power the listener into a frenzy. 5. Shamanix Albeit by far the cheesiest track here with bright, fun melodies, gaudy samples (“The way I feel I don’t expect to go to sleep for a year I’m on Fucking Fire!”) and a four to the floor rhythm Shamanix is a standout track. The cheesiness is never annoying and in 14 years has never gotten old. I still love the twists and turns the track takes especially in the final part of the track when the melody shifts and completely changes direction. There are more sounds crammed in chaotically and at times it feels dirtier than the other tracks but that dirtiness is so acidic that it crawls inside my head and just starts scratching at the inner walls of my consciousness. The atmospheres created are amazing and each turn the music makes always brings a big grin to my face. Shamanix is an excellent track with bags of psychedelic energy so it is literally bursting at the seams. 6. Snarling Black Mabel Whether Snarling Black Mabel is a play on the disgusting British lager Carling Black Label I don’t know but what I do know is that I would rather listen to this track once than have free Carling for life (really it is a pretty nasty drink). Snarling Black Mabel however is another tight colourful track with trippy hyperspace sounds but instead of the usual rushing feeling I usually get from tracks that remind me of Hyperspace I get a stationary feeling like the air around me is melting and some alternate reality, one of vivid images and twisted sounds, is creeping through. The way the synth melody seems to twist round itself like a helix in the final few minutes is an incredible experience for the mind to go through. 7. Fluoro Neuro Sponge We have a much more simplistic intro here with a more dominant beat & more obvious melodies however it all has that Hallucinogen touch to it and with Hallucinogen nothing ever remains simple. Once the track gets going the number of layers slowly increases until we have an incredibly dense track with an insane amount of things going on in the foreground, background to the left, right and centre. The way the melody evolves is a joy to behold and by the final run it is as uplifting a track as I have heard in the genre to date. The high pitched runs of spacey sounds seem to come from every direction at once directed on the melody and melting into seamlessly. Nice stuff. 8. Solstice Solstice has one of the most memorable melodies, it is simple and repetitive but sounds so good and can be hypnotic. Once again the synths and melody don’t overlap but make way for each other as if they are in awe of each other and not wanting to impose on the others magic knowing that to do so might be too much for the listener to be able to cope with. Some of the sounds feel like they are an orchestra of soulful voices screaming out from behind a veil of reality but as their souls are so strong we can still hear them on this side albeit very slightly and they sound incredibly ethereal. The energy in the track builds & builds until the end it all crashes down to end the album. 9. Angelic Particles (Remix) After 6 minutes of silence there is a hidden track, an ambient version of Angelic Particles and has a wonderful atmosphere. I would have liked this to be longer than 3 and a half minutes because it is a beautiful haunting track with some twisted female wailing and lush background drones creating a dark, spacey atmosphere. A nine minute track would have been great instead of 6 minutes of silence. Still, it is not in keeping with the rest of the album so is just a nice treat on the end of a great album.

My Thoughts

Shpongle - ...And The Day Turned To Night

Artist: Shpongle Title: Are You Shpongled? Label: Twisted Records Released: 1st October 1998 Style: Psychedelic chillout Tracklist 1 Shpongle Falls (8:33) 2 Monster Hit (8:57) 3 Vapour Rumours (10:26) 4 Shpongle Spores (7:16) 5 Behind Closed Eyelids (12:29) 6 Divine Moments Of Truth (10:20) 7 ...And The Day Turned To Night (19:57) Shpongle, the renowned project by Simon Posford and Raja Ram, often described as pioneers in the psychedelic chillout genre. Such praise does not come lightly as their debut album Are You Shpongled? is without a doubt one of the seminal albums in the chillout genre. With heavy but relaxed beats, ethereal sounds from beyond the veil, melodies that sound like they are from an alien world and twisted samples AYS? is a real listening experience. Each track by itself is great but put together as a journey the 7 tracks are more like one long journey into the twisted DMT influenced landscape that Shpongle creates so well. This is the sort of album that you do not need drugs to experience. Many people have said that this is an album that you need to smoke to or to hear under psychedelics but the music speaks for itself & does not require anything artificial to bring out the twisted fucked up greatness of it. All this needs is a keen ear and an ability to visualise music. I may be lucky “suffering” from synaesthesia so I can easily picture the alien landscapes & twisted inner visions portrayed by the music but I am sure that even the hardened cynic could experience some kind of waking lucid dream while locked away in a darkened room with only this album to assault his senses. There are great ideas but also wonderful arrangement and production, I am sure that a lot of people in this world will hate the ideas but that in my opinion is the essence of art, a select few will absolutely adore whereas the masses will never be able to understand it & they will either hate it or be indifferent to it. Are You Shpongled? is some great audio art that I am sure will be totally adored but by just a few people. Track By Track 1. Shpongle Falls We start off a little shakily with a sample that stands out a little too much from the music. The guy talking about the circular vortex spinning spinning spinning is a little bit of a distraction from the lovely wet sounds of the rest of the track. The beats are tight, the flute slips through them like they are intertwined and all in all it is one nice psychedelic opener but for the sample. It is a small qualm with an otherwise great track though and is in my opinion is one of only blips on the album. 2. Monster Hit The first time I heard this album this track really stood out for me, the beats are so much more twisted & broken than in the opening track, the vocals are cut up and rearranged tribal voices ala Deep Forest but in a much more dark and psychedelic way. Whereas Deep Forest’s vocals sounded natural and Terran these sound obscure & alien. The melodies are sweet & once again there are a lot of wet bubbly sounds going on. For me though it is when the music breaks down, the light female sounding vocals come in before the original ones float over the light emerging beat & the music feels like it is building to something. That something is a rather cheesy sample saying “It was a monster hit” but is followed by all the elements that made the track great come in with a different arrangement making it jaw droppingly good. Even after over a decade it still impresses me which is a very good sign! 3. Vapour Rumours This is a very spacey track. The whole theme seems to be about Earth’s first experience with an alien species. From the opening sample about studying UFO’s to the long sample in the middle about Humanity’s first contact with an extra terrestrial race it holds a sense of juvenile wonder that is usually lost on adults weighed down by reality. The music starts of slow and ambient but builds into some nice beat orientated twisted mayhem, then it breaks down with the first contact sample, the beats slowly come in as the sample continues then the beats and the sweet high pitched acidic melody kick in taking this way beyond terrestrial music into the realms of drug induced alien visions. Great stuff! 4. Shpongle Spores Shpongle Spores follows seamlessly with the flute linking the two tracks but from the remnants of the flute comes a great trippy melody that seems to continuously build without getting any higher like some freaky tower with steps that always go up but always return to the bottom. The quick oscillating synths that come in and out throughout the intro are extremely trippy and the second melody to come in is really sublime in its smooth spherical feeling. The melodies just keep coming and going & we even have some “Hicksville” sounding guitar sounds in the middle. 5. Behind Closed Eyelids “Behind closed eyelids in very many cases the visionary quality, the quality of the vision, some says spills over into the external world so that the experiencer when he opens his eyes sees the outer world….” Such an exquisite opening sample all the better for getting obscured at the end so the end of the speech cannot be made out but is still audible making each listen bring forward a different ending a different possibility. Slow beats with a heavy tread and two melodies, one a flute the other a synth twist around each other like a double helix before the synth melody becomes dominant and rips at the inside of the head. The flutes take over in a soothing sort of way leading back into to a more beat orientated reverie of sound and vision. The longest track on the journey besides the nigh 20 minute closing track this gets the time to evolve, move, twist, turn and surprise the listener. This remains one of my favourite Shpongle pieces to date. 6. Divine Moments of Truth Dimethyltryptamine is a psychoactive substance that can be known to bring on epiphanies or Divine Moments of Truth! Whether this is usually true or whether my mind has been warped by this track is unknown to me but ever since I have always associated this track with inebriated revelations, be it that we all live in a sideways dimension parallel to a more spiritually evolved race or that aliens are all around infiltrating our society but we are all unaware as we just can’t see that “reality” they always seem real at the time. The lyrics are decidedly cheesy, “LSD through DMT” etc but they really fit the music in a psychedelic and twisted way. The last part of the track with the whistles and the and the “okays” which sound like some motivational sports chant are the second small blip on the album. 7. …And The Day Turned To Night …And The Day Turned To Night deserves its place in the annals of music history. If Shpongle are going to be remembered for anything it will be this album and this track. The nigh on 20 minutes of pure Shpongle bliss. Everything I like about this project is here; the flutes are simple and nice with the build up in the first few minutes being quite ambient with soft beats, touches of melody and some tribal chanting along the way. The heavier elements slowly tease in with some deep rumbling bass, dirty beats and nice synths before, after what seems to be such a long long tease, the melody comes in fast with really quick synth lines giving more and more energy without any beats. When the beats kick in, even though they are some crazy, frantic beats they seem to creep in almost unnoticed like they have been there the whole time with an innocent look on their faces. There is excellent progression through the whole track nothing seems rushed despite the frenetic pace of the beats. The ambience surrounding them is great and the atmosphere adds up to one wonderful journey. This track is a great way to round of one of the great psychedelic chillout albums ever.

Or like me who just has a fried brain and doesn't need drugs to trip the light fantastic

Great! Am loving what I have heard so far

Subradial - Bioloophorm 2

Well, the only person to call Shpongle cheesy in this thread is......you! A few people have called them Crap <- Opinion, Ear Bleedingly awful <- Opinion The thing with opinions is they are always objective. I don't want to hear a subjective opinion. If you don't have opions based on emotions & personal preferences then go and debate with cold emotionless robots! Really, I have had a lot of people harp on about objectivity when talking about music but it is something I really don't want. Music is emotional & it is all about taste. This is not business or politics, people like what they like & hate what they hate and are free to express themselves. I like shpongle but IMO there is much more psychedelic music out there. Much! oh and by the way doesn't sound very objective. It sounds like your experience with drugs is influencing your opinion here. Please break the music down into it's cold components before confronting us with your so called "objective" view

This topic was originally made in August 2008 though Good for you, maybe you have similar taste to Damion. But I bought quite a few albums that he raved about being the but was mostly disappointed. Even some of the decent ones like Scorb & Mood Deluxe were not nearly as good as he saif they were. Mood Deluxe was in his words "the start of a whole new genre of music" but was merely pretty good. Scorb was supposed to be this amazing insta-classic but was nowhere near as good as the first scorb album. Maybe I just don't have similar taste as him but it was so easy to get wrapped up in what he was saying. Still his negative reviews were great

Yeah, this reamians my favourite Kettel album too

The reissue is being sold at fairly reasonable prices on discogs Databloem records are very trustworthy in my experience. Don't hesitate, just get it It's definitely worth it

The Circular Ruins - Immer Du

The Circular Ruins - Falling Into The Sky

That's exactly what I am going to tell you. For me there is no Shpongle track that even comes close to The Answer Why do you think there is a lack of objectivity here? Do you think that we are all part of The Infinity Project? Or enemies with Raja Ram? People having different taste to you does mean they have a lack of objectivity. If anything it would be the other way round as the Shpongle project has been much more popular & well known than any of TIP's ambient works. I could say you are not objective but just following popular trends, but I wont as I don;t care why someone likes something over another thing. Taste really is taste. It boggles my mind trying to think about why some people just don't get this BTW Shpongle is Simon Posford & Raja Ram, they get A LOT of praise, maybe even more than they deserve

Just finished (val)Liam - Daydreamer and bow on (val)Liam - Early Reflections