V/A - Escape From Chaos

[psychedelic_mustache]

Artists: various

Title: Escape From Chaos

Label: Tempest Recordings

Catalog: TEMPEST8

Format: CD

Released: 2006

 

 

Tracklist:

 

01. Terra Nine - Foxtrot Alpha

02. Spies Vs. Red Eye Express - Sogno D'Oro

03. Eridani vs. J. West - Zero Crossing

04. Random Designers vs Arcane Trickster - Golden Triangle (Terra Nine Remix)

05. Emu - Homeland

06. Side Liner - Moonlight

07. The Omm Squad vs. Psyburbia - The Exploration of Deep Bass

08. Terra Nine vs. Random Designers - Entelechy

09. System Seven - Alpha Wave (Mirror system remix)

10. Zero Cult - Utopia Train

11. Geo - Glow Motion (Short Edit)

12. Red Eye Express - Aqua

 

"Escape from Chaos" is the latest installment of Australia-based Tempest recordings. I'm not familiar with the labels entire back-catalog, but what I've heard from them before has varied in quality. The lineup here is interesting with both well-known names and some for me more unknown artists...Well, let's get busy and try to escape the chaos!

 

01.Terra Nine - Foxtrot Alpha

We open extremely mellow and smooth with terra nine's "Foxtrot alpha". Smooth ambient soundscapes blend with some celtic-sounding violins before a pretty simple and straightforward beat and some bass kicks in. It all sounds very simple - and it is really simple! Here this isn't a bad thing, though - and it's somewhat liberating to listen to some rather stripped down chillage for once. A nice, steadilly flowing opening of the album!

 

02: Spies Vs. Red Eye Express - Sogno D'Oro

Spies shouldn't really be a stranger to most people, and here he teams up with red eye express to produce "Sogno D'Oro"(Whatever that means...). It's quite apparent that two different creative forces has been ivolved here. The liquid dub'ish and guitardriven Red Eye Express blends nicely with the more electroid, upbeat and rather crazy spies-sound(Atleast thats my guess, annyways...). The track works well enough, but I think I'd be more happy if this was made into two sepparate tracks and if the different idease were explored more on their own.

 

03: Eridani vs. J. West - Zero Crossing

This is my first encounter with both of these artists. They deliver a pretty straightforward piece of music. It's got some dubby elements, some melodic chords here and there and every now and then the beat accelerates and the sound shifts to more dancehall-inspired grooves. This really doesn't tase like my favourite green tea, and I find the piece to be rather dull and empty. One of those tracks you find dusins of on more comercially aimed chill-comps. Next!

 

04: Random Designers vs Arcane Trickster - Golden Triangle (Terra Nine Remix)

Terra Nine Remixes the track "Golden triangle" taken from the 2004 compilation "chill on ice". This version is a tad spiced up, and as with the first track here I think Terra Nine manages to do alot with just a few elements. This is a bit more on the upeat electronica side of things and where the original was somewhat tribally inspired this is more electro-driven and warmer... Pretty nice!

 

05: Emu - Homeland

Emu is another artist I know nothing of from before this. This however is a rathe nice piece of music. A deep bass-ridden and somewhat melancholic mood arches over this thing. The thing I like so much about it is that even though this is largely a deep and somewhat introspective piece there is also alot of variation as far as melody and general composition is concerned. Oh - and seldom has a trumpet sounded so in place! Very nice!

 

06: Sideliner - Moonlight

Sideliner recently suprised me with a pretty nice debut on his own label cosmic leaf. This track moves largely in the same terretory, but I think this lacks alot of the emotion and feeling found on the album. The beats here are "bigger" than alot of those from his album, but the soundscape is more minimal. This is like your average chill-piece....it just flows by in the background without causing much joy or irritation.....Thus it does not stand out among the other tracks here, even though the more melodic parts of the track works well..

 

07: The Omm Squad vs. Psyburbia - The Exploration of Deep Bass

What can I say? The guys pretty much sums it up with the title of this track. the dubby deep bass pretty much drives this track forward alongside a range of other sounds. The breakbeat here leans more towards the trip-hop side of the scale and the first 3-4 minuts of this thing I actually find dreadfully boring. It opens up however, and with the addition of more fluid and changing music, melodies and sounds it gets alot better. Pretty decent track.

 

08: Terra Nine vs. Random Designers - Entelechy

Terra Nine teams up with the Random designers to create entelechy. Yet again a track terra Nine is involved with stands out in my book. My guess here is that terra nine is largely responsible for creating those sweet but yet somewhat sad soundscapes that this track centeres around. Add to this a rather monotonus but effectfull beat and some nifty electronics and you've got yourself a nice little track!

 

09: System 7 - Alpha Wave (Mirror system remix)

System 7 needs no introduction as they've been active on the electronic musicscene for what seems to be an eternity... Here Steve Hillage's new project "mirror system" remixes the classic ninties-track "alpha wave". It's ceirtanly got a nostalgic value. It's got this happy, naive feel going. Slow four/four beats , some breakbeats, nice melody-work and a repeated voice-sample... It's nice to see the that the dinosaurs are active and that they still havent lost their touch..

 

10: Zero Cult - Utopia Train

Zero Cult is due to release his debut album in the not-to-distant future and here he warms us up with a ride on the utopia train. The track is darker than most others on the compilations and also moves more within the ambient sphere. It's almost completely beatless for about four minutes, and the most important thing to note here is the dark and constantly morphing soundscapes. It's also perhaps a tad more "psychedelic" than most tracks here...Competition in this genere is hard, and this doesn't reac the leves of - say - solar fields..It's not a spectacular piece of music, but it's still pretty nice

 

11. Geo - Slow Motion(Short Edit)

Here we have another artist I've never met before. Geo delivers a pretty straightforward chill-track. This time we're again heading more in the direction you might expect to find on chill-comps with names featuring words like "ibiza" and/or "absolute" and so forth. It's bass, a pretty simple piano-melody and some beats. Nice enough for the beach, but pretty boring if you want to listen to music...

 

12. Red Eye Express - Aqua

Red Eye Express finishes off the album with "Aqua" - a solid track that moves in several directions. It opens as an ambien freefloating piece, but gradually builds while constantly adding new elements. In the end this actually turs rather funky. It's got a warm, cozy atmosphere and the guitars softens things up. There is a lot of musicallity here! I do however suspect that psy-purists will dislike this because of it's overall "cleanness"....Me? Oh I rather enjoyed it!

 

Final Remarks:

So, what do we have here? well- there's a little of this and a little of that. The compilation is pretty varied and touches quite a few different styles. At the end of the day it's a well excecuted piece of work, though. I really like some of the tracks on display here, and especially Terra 9 left me with a very good feeling. If you're in the mood for a nice little mixture of tracks ranging from dub, to ambient and some straightforward chilled electronics this might be worth checking out!

 

Tomas (Psychedelic Mustache)

 

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review from MIKE G.

AmbientMusicGuide.com @ http://www.ambientmusicguide.com

The Cosmic Lounge, Chillout Channel @ http://www.di.fm

Ultima Thule, 2MBS-FM Sydney @ http://www.ultimathule.info

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VARIOUS ARTISTS

Escape From Chaos (Tempest Recordings)

 

 

Unicorn/Cosmicleaf and the Australia's Tempest Recordings clearly share a philosphy, right down to the appearance of several Cosmicleaf artists on this Oz label's first downtempo compilation Escape From Chaos. All tracks are exclusives however, so no overlaps. The underground scene we could loosely call psy-trance and progressive is attracting some fantastic and varied ambient talent, I'm guessing due to the general disregard for barriers and fashion that constrict pretty much every other "dance" genre. Escape From Chaos offers a little more electro grunge and scary bass-heavy sounds than Side Liner's effort but its no less beautiful or substantial. Around half the artists here are local including Terra Nine, Random Designers and Red Eye Express. Guitar sounds among them are popular; lets face it, rock is part of the Australian DNA. All up there's twelve tracks of only slightly varying quality and no duds at all, and once again the massive sci-fi dub of Zero Cult leaves me floating in the stratosphere. A solo album by this gifted Israeli is out soon - watch the skies.

 

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Review by Djane Original-Rocket

Mushroom Magazine issue #132 June 06

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"...As the title suggests: finally a bit of peace...Michael Westcot aka Terra Nine,

a man that's already compiled so many ambient Cds for other succesful labels

like ZYX,Green Ant & Tempest, always seems to manage chilled grooves finely

blended with electronic strings and a load of downbeat to go with it. Wonderfully

relaxing music with a few classic gems tucked in there. Rating: Psychedelically valuable

and especially chilled, even if it does occasionally approach 130 bpm. Definitely give it

a listen. Some of the tracks ar ideal for starting an exciting Dj-set..."

 

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Review from Revolve Magazine UK

Reviewer: Nova (Ultimae Records)

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"VA Escape from Chaos (Tempest)...

 

And now something new from upside-down! With "Escape From Chaos", Melbourne-based Tempest Recordings have compiled their first chill-out release from the "Tempest Chill" series, exploring the downtempo side of the label where artists can release the music that please them.

 

Featuring on this tasty and different (not much innovative though) compilation is a mixture of established artists such as System7 (with a nice remix of "Alpha Wave") and newcomers from different corners of the world (solid tracks by Side Liner and Zero Cult). The mood is always very positive and the music styles range from dubby breaks to more ambient moments.

 

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Review by ZawHeR

http://radio.powernet.bg/

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One fantastic ambient adventure into deeper land of freedom and nowhere.

12 interwined tracks, which collect into yourself every little tiny "raindrop", and make you "cry" from happiness.

 

01. Terra Nine - Foxtrot Alpha - very beautiful and easy starting, with nice and balanced melody and drums.

 

02. Spies vs Red Eye Express - Sogno D'Oro - A little diversion from normally sound, but sound interesting.

 

03. Eridani vs J West - Zero Crossing - Yes it's Zero Crossing... this explain very good this track - Deep, strong, wonderful!

 

04. Random Designers vs Arcane Trickster - Golden Triangle (Terra Nine Remix) - eight minute of epic and melodic balanced sounds. Good work again Terra Nine!

 

05. Emu - Homeland - Excellent! Very smooth cymbals, very slow, very pure voice from nowhere...

 

06. Side Liner - Moonlight - This track is exactly like Moonlight - Tender, stonger, mighty, powerful, it's "dream reality". Extravagant and perfect - the style of Side Liner.

 

07. The Omm Squad vs Psyburbia - The Exploration of Deep Bass - Interesting, and unnormallity ambient track. It's more trip-hop, jazzy with smooth beats, and jigging melody.

 

08. Terra Nine vs Random Designers - Entelechy - Good duel, boys & girls! Here we have advantage of one constantly tune, with nice admixture of second, which make this track so "take away".

 

09. System 7 - Alpha Wave (Mirror System Remix) - Very nice drums, with strange voice which comes from time to time. Good remix Mirror System, with nice ideas, and good realized of it.

 

10. Zero Cult - Utopia Train - What track! So magic, so vigorous...take you away, into another dream space. This power, this beautiful...perfect!

 

11. Geo - Glow Motion (Short Edit) - One very, very, very good smooth, and chilly slow motion ambient ....

 

12. Red Eye Express - Aqua - The decency between this, and some track from Cafe Del Mar for expample, it's very close. But here we have some differeneces which make this track special for us.

 

At all - unique compilation!