Joujouka - Re-model

[Lemmiwinks]

 

1. Are you elovetric? (Numanoid vs The Hypist rmx)

2. Boxrocker (Minoru rmx)

3. Pipes of peace (Joujoukas vss rmx)

4. Are you elovetric? (Thomas P.Heckmann rmx)

5. Punx play vidio game (Nothern Lite harder rmx)

6. New asian (Justin Robertson rmx)

7. Relax (feat. Native Starecase rmx)

8. Geo ash (PIiliavin and Zimbardo rmx)

 

 

So Joujouka is back this time with a remix album... and going further and further away from anything that sounds even remotley like psytrance. Well, at least by now the "genre classifcation catalogue" seems to have caught up, that's why for example you can buy this CD on Psyshop yet Joujouka are described there as "a new wave electro band"... But let's not forget that other pioneers in goatrance gradually moved away from psy and are now producing stuff that have nothing to do with the genre (IM, X Dream,...) so if anything, Joujouka should be praised for being the first former-pioneers to move to something completley different So how does all this sound?

 

The remixes of Are You Elovetric? and Boxrocker simply sound like rock music, you can almost close your eyes and imagine these guys playing in an MTV video! The whole sound is VERY much like Lords of Acid's later work. Personally I've always found the whole voice thing over electronic music ridiculous...

 

Pipes of Peace sounds more like some crossover between industrial and techno, it actually works out pretty well in the end. One of the better tracks here.

 

Now comes yet another remix of Are You Elovetric? but this time by acid techno god Thomas P Heckman. So you could've expected some screaming 303s in there at least, no? Well, no... it's just the same loop played over and over again for more than 6 minutes... Well, you do get an interesting melody developing in the background starting from 5:30 but it's just too little, to late...

 

Punx Play Video Game comes again with the industrial rockish side... Again we're into MTV video realm here...

 

Then a remix from New Asians . Hmm actually this one sounds pretty decent, there are some tribal techno influences. We're still far away from classical territory here but again, this is one of the better tracks on this album.

 

Then comes the re-remix of the famous tune from Frankie Goes to Hollywood . Just why do these people keep tampering with that classic is beyond me... BUT this time around the result is actually pretty good and this is one of the only track here that comes close to (technoish) trance...

 

Finally, a downtempo track with the remix of Geo ash . Well interestingly enough this one reminds me of some VERY old trance, things like Psychik Warriors Ov Gaia , Techno Grooves - Aboriginal and such: a tribal feeling and VERY repetitive sounds. So in some sorts this one comes clostest to the original definition of trance the way it once used to be.

 

Conclusion Well I guess that by now we're all used to the idea of Tsuyoshi Suzuki having moved away from psytrance so it doesn't really surprise me that this album sounds like industrial rock on one side and techno on the other (with the exception of the last track). I won't rate this cause it ain't psytrance, I'll just say that if you want to broaden your CD collection with new "non-psy sounds" you might just like this. And the last track deserves special mentioning IMO since it's the ONLY modern track that sounds very much like some very old tribal trance (I'm talking about "pre-goa" stuff). But is ONE track worth buying the whole CD? I'll let you decide...