DeathPosture Posted December 29, 2005 Share Posted December 29, 2005 V/A – Trauma Trance Hi-res cover: front + back Artist: Various Title: Trauma Trance Format: CD (jewel case) Label: Mistress Of Evil (USA) Cat. #: MOE 66602 Distribution: Wirikuta Date: December 2005 Track listing: 01. 08’15” Tsabeat & Optical Human - Madbeat 02. 06’59” Quasar – Brief Psychotic Disorder 03. 08’21” Alien Mental - SychoShift 04. 09’18” Amanda - Meltdown Sequence Initiation 05. 09’36” Horror Place – Children Of The Night 06. 09’14” Xyla – Cyrene’s Ghost 07. 08’57” Ghreg On Earth – Unrealized Reality 08. 10’38” Mandrugorrah – Lulla-Bye .m3u-playlist: http://tinyurl.com/a6svo (all tracks!) Review: Deck the Halls with Boughs of Holly… Falalalalalalaallaah! Trauma Trance is the second release from San Fransisco based label Mistress Of Evil following the successful Lhiannon Sidhe: A Forest Faerie With A Fatal Touch released in 2004… The promotional text defines trauma trance as ‘music meant to shake you up mentally, meant to stir up emotions and meant to push you forward to new perceptions and ways about thinking’… Rrrrright! Now that we have that out of the way, let’s dig deeper into the music… Let me take you thru the tracks… #01: Tsabeat & Optical Human – Madbeat I have absolutely no idea who these people are, but AFAIK this is their first released track… Anyway, it should come as no surprise that we’re dealing with acid-ridden darkpsy here – with an alleged mad beat… And mad it is indeed… The first couple of minutes are pretty standard, but luckily the track opens up into Babylonian mayhem of heavily syncopated acid-lines laid on top of some mean ass drill&bass… Pretty good track, but I’m not too impressed with that final demented rundown… #02: Quasar – Brief Psychotic Disorder “Brief psychotic disorder!” Ahh – good old Quasar! The fractal cowboy who has yet to let me down with his unique, contrast-filled hypertrance… And sure enough – this is an impressive track too… Bursting with raw energy from the very first second and onwards… And not too dark and pretentious – just the way I like it… Reminds me of Kemic-Al, Penta or oCeLot… Top drawer psychedelic night trance with enough variation and funny bits to keep me entertained… Kick ass track! #03: Alien Mental – SychoShift Alien Mental is a young dude from India and this is his debut release… The intro is pretty smooth, but I’m not too impressed by the initial bland bassline which sounds like something even Goa Gil would write off as too dark… Anyway, as the track progresses more FX are added and things lighten up a bit… Acid always helps and the break-down is pretty nice… Halfway through there are a couple of minutes when everything gets a little too boring - And what’s up with recycling samples already used by other artists? Anyway, luckily things picks up towards the end and all in all this is a pretty decent track… #04: Amanda - Meltdown Sequence Initiation Amanda Wright is one of the co-founders of M.O.E. and also had a track featured on the first release… And holy shit, what a track this is… I haven’t got software to count BPMs, but this must be among the fastest here… Shit, that bassline is indeed hypnotizing and those creepy sounds in the background don’t exactly make things less spooky… So yeah, this is as close to nightmare trance as you can go within psytrance – kinda like Xenomorph meets The Delta meets Cannibal Corpse… Unfortunately the ultra fast-slash-über dark profile of this track doubles as a depressor… I mean, I’m all for darkpsy, but this is really pushing the limits… It’s getting too damn dark! Anyway, whatever you do make sure not to play this track to kids, pets or mentally unstable persons… It might trigger something! Yikes! #05: Horror Place – Children Of The Night I have no info on Horror Place whatsoever, but from what I can gather this is another debutant… An aptly named one too, as this is indeed horror-trance… A high-pitched synth stab completely penetrates your eardrums – and leaves you confused and breathless… Holy shit, this is downright evil stuff… Definitely not for the faint-hearted – and I imagine dogs will have a hard time digesting this one too… Repulsive in the most psychopathic of ways… I fear to watch, yet I cannot look away… Blimey! #06: Xyla – Cyrene’s Ghost “I was just trying to give it some colour, it seemed so awfully dark! Well, you have to convince people that you’re me, and I like dark!” Xyla is another female producer from the San Francisco underground… And well, yeah, we’re still exploring traumatic trance crossing well over into noise, but where the previous tracks were quite simply too fucked up for my taste, this one sits better with me… Don’t get me wrong, this is still some repulsive shit that would make Squaremeat run up a tree – and that’s meant as a compliment, mind you! Evil, dark, twisted, pounding psytrance – relentless to the core… Biiiatch! Wikkid track! #07: Ghreg On Earth – Unrealized Reality Greg Carson from the US is gaining increased respect within darkpsy circles – most recently with the release of his debut album Sigilweaver released by Wirikuta… As usual, Ghreg shows us his industrial take on dark psytrance – avoiding the most obvious noize pitfalls... What we get here is a mixture between dark melodic psytrance/tekKnoid tech-trance and industrial… And no-one does that better than this guy… This easily sounds like something that could have been on the recent AuraQuake compilation Seismic Moods… Something extremely raw, but yet totally well-polished… Hypnotic too! This also doubles as a great tool for setting up your speakers – if they can play this, they can play anything! It took me a while to get into this, but now I totally dig it! #08: Mandrugorrah – Lulla-Bye Once again, I have no info on this artist – but who cares; it’s time for a lullaby… The track starts with some soulful singing which is soon brutally interrupted by the meanest bassline this side of the Atlantic… Approaching the two-minute mark, it’s gone completely gabba… Gabba? That’s right; the BPM must be well over 160 on this one, and frankly that where I start to loose interest… The promotional info refers to this track as a ‘sound experiment’ and yeah, I believe that… As such, it’s fun listening to this, but that’s all… I get no aural pleasure from this at all… But I’m sure some freaks will find this entertaining… Sweet mother of Ghandi! Not since the Overlap album have my ears hurt as much after listening to a CD in my headphones… And this time, I don’t think the compression is off – the music is just so fucking hardcore, that your ears will hate after listening to this at a high volume… My ears are still ringing from that last track… Yikes! But hey, I’m sure there’s someone perverted enough out there to actually find pleasure in those deviant tracks… Hell, I’m one of ‘em! But, I have to admit that there were a couple of tracks that I didn’t like at all… I never thought, I’d hear myself say this, but a couple of tracks here are simply too hardcore for my taste… Taste is the keyword, and as I mentioned earlier, I’m sure even those perverted tracks will find their audience among fans of hardcore nightmare trance…It doesn’t come any harder than this! So yeah, fans of the darker side of psytrance will most likely also take well to this, but for anyone else I must advice you to sample the tracks before purchase… Whatever rocks your boat – enjoy! Favourites: 2(!), 3, 6(!), 7 DeathPosture External links: Mistress Of Evil: http://www.mistressofevil.com Discogs: http://www.discogs.com/release/574428 Beatspace: http://tinyurl.com/b6n6l Wirikuta: http://tinyurl.com/chfh6 Psyshop: http://tinyurl.com/cl3t2 Saiko: http://tinyurl.com/9wj7w Chaos: http://tinyurl.com/aahak Ajuca: http://tinyurl.com/dvt6k Juno: http://tinyurl.com/d2naj Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RAH2D2 Posted December 29, 2005 Share Posted December 29, 2005 damn, man this gave me shivers just reading about it Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gnome Posted December 29, 2005 Share Posted December 29, 2005 Just another compilation,nothing special.I have 42 comps from 2005,most of them sound exactly the same.Maybe if they released some albums too so we could have unique styles like Derango,Ocelot or Procs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gnome Posted December 29, 2005 Share Posted December 29, 2005 #05: Horror Place – Children Of The Night I have no info on Horror Place whatsoever, but from what I can gather this is another debutant… No its actually Alex (Zik,Matutero,whatever). Come on,you can see it from his style,if you like his projects. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
delars Posted December 29, 2005 Share Posted December 29, 2005 is adrenal glands also the same guy? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RAH2D2 Posted December 29, 2005 Share Posted December 29, 2005 is adrenal glands also the same guy? 405542[/snapback] i think, so... he has more aliases than tracks Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
agia_igoumeni Posted December 29, 2005 Share Posted December 29, 2005 LOL Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dajek Posted December 29, 2005 Share Posted December 29, 2005 -. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dmtree Posted December 29, 2005 Share Posted December 29, 2005 Wow what an awesome compilation - tracks 2,3,5,6 here are EXCELLENT! more interesting and psychedelic than anything else released this year (on par with a couple of other comps maybe). some of this stuff makes Derango sound dated (which it kinda is anyway). the Zik track is kick-ass - watch out for two of his albums coming out in February (under Adrenal Glands and Matutero, i believe), he is probably the hottest producer in the galaxy right now. . Quasar album also ready - coming out on MoE this spring, afaik. also I think Tsabeat released a track on Gi'iwa's first comp under a different name, I forget which one it is.. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frontier Psychiatrist Posted December 29, 2005 Share Posted December 29, 2005 also I think Tsabeat released a track on Gi'iwa's first comp under a different name, I forget which one it is.. 405673[/snapback] Sattel Battle Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FrO Posted January 5, 2006 Share Posted January 5, 2006 Bare with me as I try to express how I feel about the compilation.... 1#Tsabeat & Optical Human We start off with Tsabeat&Optical Human - Madbeat, and get a "little" sense of whats coming up during the next hour!A pretty decent track with a madbeat for sure, but it didnt quite didnt catch my attention compared to the other tracks featured on this compilation! Maybe I need to listen more ? 2#Quasar-Brief Psychotic Disorder Quasar is picking it up from here, and taking it up a notch causing brief psychotic disorders in 150 beats per minute!Every time I hear a new track from Quasar I get blown away by the hyper drumrolls and twisted melodies often heard in his music. Funny and psychedelic as allways, exelent track! 3#Alien Mental-Sychoshift Are you ready for Alien Mental ? Well after probably a hundred listens ,if not even more, I have come to the conclusion that this has to be my favorite track on the compilation! The flow of funny sounds and hard leads fits very nice together imo,and the powerful bassline doesnt make it less lovable!! About the recycling of samples, I dont mind at all, I find it quite refreshing to hear one of the coolest samples ever used being recycled like this in such a mental track! 4#Amanda-Meltdown Sequence Initiation Ever since Amanda's first track on Lhiannon Sidhe ive been nothing but curious of what else she had up here sleeve, and no surprise here, this is by far even crazier than expected! Extremely deep and mirky bassline rolling away in 150bpm, sounds to shake and stir you up emotionally, a rather hypnotic and traumatic track!Personally I really really really like it, but can understand that this could be a bit too much for some people! Meltdown Sequence Initiation Complete! 5#Horror Place-Children Of The Night Horror Place is another project by Zik/Matutero and the keyword here is "Spooky"... The tweaked out evil sounds in Children of the night suits the trackname perfect ,loads of creepy samples manipulated in a way to give anyone the shivers,and offcourse a very powerful 150bpm bassline to back it all up with drummrolls going up, down sideways and whatnot! A very tasteful and original track! The upcoming album makes me wonder what the hell we are in for, but anyways , im prepared ! 6#Xyla-Cyrene's Ghost Xyla's debut release was like a breath of fresh air to me, and im glad there is more female producers writing disturbing music like this! We are now cruising in 147bpm with rumbling bassline somewhat similar to the metallaxis style heard lately! Metallic and traumatic noize flows thru the entire track with a lighter melody on top which makes it a little easyer to swallow!Im really looking forward to hear more from Xyla and the Xylamanda project! 7#Ghreg On Earth-Unrealized Reality Next up is Ghreg on Earth, and if you havent gotten enough from his recent album Sigilweaver here's more goodies to digest! I find Ghregs music highly professional and well composed,not like everything else on any other menu.Like most of his previous tracks released we get here also Industrial ,psychedelic and techy sounds with dark melodies .very trippy and hypnotic, maybe a little slow compared to the rest of the tracks here, but still very very good! 8#Mandrugorrah-Lulla Bye Mandrugorrah is a sideproject of the hungarians Para Halu, and this is a nice way to finnish the traumatic experience we have just been thru, non the less this track is probably more crazy than all the other ones put toghether and that should say most of it! Bloody overdrive , pounding beat and disturbing sounds pushes the limits to what we can call psytrance or traumatrance in that matter! But all in all a sweet Lullabye track for late nights,it will be interesting to hear more from the Mandrogorrah project in the future! So okay , In my oppinion this is possibly the coolest compilation released in 2005! I see some people find this a bit too hardcore ? Well, for me Im glad something like this finally happend, and that the M.o.E gals had the balls to put it out there for all of us to enjoy! Its not everyday we get music like this released, but I feel this is a new day so im quite exited to see whats coming the following months and year! I had some time to properly digest this compilation, and it has rarely left my cd player since I got it! It has been an intense listening experience from beginning till now, and the more I listen the more I love it! Fun ,disturbing and psychedelic traumatrance from the sunny westcoast! Keep it up M.o.E , this brings true meaning to high quality underground ! Favorites: 2, 3(!!!), 4(!!!), 5(!!), 6(!!), 7, 8 Love&Light Frode Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ormion Posted January 10, 2006 Share Posted January 10, 2006 Now this is good! Dark, mean and hard! Fav track must be the Xyla's one but I really like Ghreg On Earth, Zik and Mandrugorrah (great intro). The Quasar track is really weird and Amanda's has a great opening. The worst (but still ok) must be the Alien Mental one. Good but too typical. 8/10 easily. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest The Journey Man Project Posted April 28, 2006 Share Posted April 28, 2006 Hmmm was somewhat dissapointed with this release... it was nowhere as a hardcore as I thought... maybe because I received the new Trishula compilation at the same time, this just pales by comparison... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.