Xamanist - Initiation (Ektoplazm)

[psytones]

Ektoplazm keeps on pushing out electronic dance and chill music for the thirsty listeners, and this release is one of those that shows you that incredible gems can and will be found at Ektoplazm's homepage. At this music portal you will find tons of music released for free in optional qualities like WAV, mp3 and FLAC. And if you feel like using money to receive a original CD, you're also welcomed to do so. This is a review of the Xamanist album, and I recommend you to get it fast, because words will never be able to explain such complex beauty and vivid imagination! This is my humble trial of writing a review for its genius.

 

Xamanist - Initiation (Ektoplazm) 2009 (EKTLP02WAV)

 

 

1 Machu Picchu 7:07

2 Dancing Samadhi 7:15

3 Truth And Beauty 7:28

4 Across The Universe 7:07

5 This Is A Warning 7:40

6 Intergalactic 7:46

7 I'm Just Amazed 8:21

8 White Magik 7:48

9 Atlantis 7:00

 

 

1. In deep rumbling thoughts of enchanting throats, voices are transcended out by Terrence McKenna’s understandable voice followed by a star striking lift in energy pulsations until the acid sounds roam inside a room followed by a simple yet very effective kick and bass which makes the atmosphere go Goapsy. The melodies are entrancing and astral travelling, the story varies and surprises as the sounds and effects play with angelic tribadelic progressive powers!

 

2. Weird moods, creative tones and smashing drums. The bassline is deeper and more movable inside the funk village. The melodies get’s trolled out inside a lively forest of frogs and funny creatures smiling while viewing their arms in hypnotic and lingering gestures. Charming stuff inside this track for sure, sneaky and mysteriously spooky with so much going on in weirdo control.

 

3. Nice intro with interesting words, the bassline play gets ready for work while speech expresses their brotherly words of wisdom, before it gets on running down the creak with flattering metal sheets and jumping harmonica. Exiting stuff appears to be building with sounds made in good spirit and intentional behaviors.

 

4. Guitars. Bassline with doped crickets and a kick that is more calm and affirming, the energy level is roxie with good effects. Cool scratching like sound that points the filling while voices sway inside deep atmospheres and at times, osculated guitars playing around somewhere in the Middle East watching the sky being filled up by power puffs. Noisy but in an authentic FullOn industrial Rock n’Psy context, intense as it pushes the sanity to subtle spaced out harmonies.

 

5. Electro-tech vibes in a sexy and dirty industrial environment with funk placed on the groove and progress on the beat manifestation. Shamanic elements while the hi-hat and clash comes to life to create life and devotion in its light bold. Midways it sonically flips your ears and air pressure into delightful madness of the stompers behind bushes with weird tangents on their keyboard and showcased moods. Some crazy magician is mood’eling the skies. The beat is defiantly more humping then the others.

 

6. Haunting white fog moods with running effects and a teller’s journey with an aim to reach a distant target. Trippy basslines with appreciated effects inspired by the real stuff. Some heavier old-skool Isratrance synths surrounded by falling swirling dense sprinkles and other fun sounds and effects. What a ride, like being inside Oz’s house, should get a remix by the Yggdrasil guys ?

 

7. Creepy stuff, the raw bassline chews and metal-piping echoes, beat stomps strong and heavily slow. Fun is about to get it on, synthesizers crunch and sounds fills a void and works your energy wide and far. Some 50’s sort of funk feel runs the state of drifting machinery which contains mood’lightening, jumping frogs and morbid time confusing realizations. The variation and technique of creating something trippy and adventures is perfectly done with the biggest smile of odd. As melodies floats you in mystery, shamanic thoughts return with ruff padding abiding it out of the blue into the green harmonic joy fest raggadi’da. This is totally dreamful, hypnotic delicious and very creative, always with a tripper’s laughter in mind.

 

8. Flickering state of seeing through our reflective eyes introduces a hard knocking bassline which develops and moves while creating. There is something about psychedelics that can scare. .. . .. . . . .. . . .Do you like to get scared? ... ... Weird effect usage in perfect tones to create wet and sprinkled feelings, it makes your mind think your skin is dripping star rain and, for sure... It feels strange and real on your face. Well done on the effect usage, Dr. Xamenist! Get’s a bit weary as it goes but in all good sense, it got an olden and golden vibe to it.

 

9. Last track, metal drumming, effecting space-bubbles while deep bass and hovering static carpets fly over your head and tribadelic progression walks. Slamming whips your walls and cosmic synth-works complicates while being adored only to calm down in yet speed of attention and gymnastic Yoga in space. Drops are clearly presence. Water boarding, funny how it’s used as torture by a corrupt government, while in psychedelialand, it’s a massive trip’effector. Tension getting more lurking and bursting of lava like colour flows.

 

 

Recommendations: This is PsyTrance, this is just bloody amazing!

 

. I truly like the Xamenist’s way of telling complicated stories and progression of creating moods and strange pauses for the trip to exhale, inhale and exceed. It got loads of great power, great journeys, great fun and I'm sure, a great person! This album seems to have the authentic charm of creating something very interesting that should appeal to most people into this dunkadunk music we love. Both fans of older Goa-vibe tunes and trippy freestyle grooves and new power should be pleased by Xamanist’s Initiation album.

 

The beats, kick, bassline and... Well, everything has been different and varieted throughout. Some of the key-words here are fun, energetic, space, trippy, intense, smiling, growling and much more, all under a feel and appreciation of not sounding too confused and not becoming boring. This is hands down a fantastic album, great feel and amazing journey! There is a lot of bending tricks and a lot of trials of being something very trippy, and it works. Maybe a clear identity isn’t totally achieved since it seems to be diving in all bags of tricks, but it for sure is something special and worth checking out. It’s as complex and fun as one could imagine this genre to be, it got a lot of inspiration inside with a sense of originality and to be honest, this music should be listened to, not read about. Check it out!!

 

Any problems? There is a lot of stuff being pushed through the speakers and for what I love, is also where it falls. By trying to be too much.

 

The arwork by Adam Scott Miller is very beautiful and the mastering by Akhentek seems to be near perfect.

 

 

Favorite tracks: 1(!!), 2(!!), 3(!!), 4(!), 5, 6, 7, 8(!), 9(!!)

 

Total Score: 9.8/10

 

Promotional text:

 

Xamanist, based in Portugal, is Sérgio Ribeiro (Serguei) a PsyTrance producer born in 1977, the year they discovered rings around Uranus, Star Wars hit the cinemas and Elvis Presley, the king of rock and roll dies from a drug overdose in his home in Graceland at an age of 42. It is told that since childhood the Xamanist has been playing guitar, bass, and synthesizers, so it should be no surprise that he eventually became very interested in composing electronic dance music after discovering psychedelic trance at the Boom Festival, 2000. Followed by this life-changing event, Sérgio joined forces with Syul to form Swan X-1. Together they performed their PsyTrance live across Portugal until it got disbanded in 2007. With this reflection of life experience as a basic foundation, Sérgio established the Xamanist project to concentrate on developing his own original style of psychedelic trance inspired by the pool of collective knowledge and inner uniqueness.

 

Xamanist defiantly aims to blend the old with the new, balancing darkness with light and melody with rhythm. So you can expect to hear classic Goa-trance influences mixed with progressive arrangements and with piches of FullOn, not the plastic. The energy, creative flow and storytelling are presented with beauty and might with a lot of weird corners to enjoy, and of course, it has high degree of psychedelism! Welcome, to the initiation Exam, I hope you have studied hard, because the Xamanist is a fair and determined guard who provides all the material for a successful experience.

 

Xamanist performs LIVE on guitar and synths, bringing a human touch to every show. For booking information, please email xamanist[@]gmail.com.

 

Where to buy, download for free and other links:

X-MySpace: http://www.myspace.com/xamanist

X-Discogs: http://www.discogs.com/artist/Xamanist

Free Download + buy CD: http://www.ektoplazm.com/free-music/xamanist-initiation

Ektoplazm: http://www.ektoplazm.com

Ektoplazm Discogs: http://www.discogs.com/label/Ektoplazm

More Reviews: http://www.myspace.com/psytonesmusic

[FTP]

His live set here was pretty good, let's see if the production got some tweaks

[Uth]

Really cool album! Highly recommended.

[Xamanist]

Thanks Psytones for the great review! And Uth for the kind words

 

@FTP: I was not "there" for a live set... maybe some confusion?

 

I would love to hear what others think about this album, feel free to download and comment!

 

Peace

[Xamanist]

more reviews?

[Jon Cocco]

Xamanist - Initiation

2009

 

 

 

 

1 Machu Picchu ... 7:07

2 Dancing Samadhi ... 7:15

3 Truth And Beauty ... 7:28

4 Across The Universe ... 7:07

5 This Is A Warning ... 7:40

6 Intergalactic ... 7:46

7 I'm Just Amazed ... 8:21

8 White Magik ... 7:48

9 Atlantis ... 7:00

 

 

 

This is a thinking outside the box album, relative to the artist at least; I can't imagine him not becoming absorbed in his imagination in order to create this. That energy has taken time to grow on me however. I heard Initiation earlier in 2009 several times, and I wasn't sure what to think of it. I think that the far out/artistic style came across as more alien and experimental to me than instantly enjoyable and addictive, though I remember liking parts of it. Other parts I had to let grow on me until I heard this album the week I wrote this. Nonetheless, there appears to be a high amount of experimental work, innovation here; it's done in the broad spectrum of psy and trance and well, another possibly sub style could/may have emerged out of this, but experimental psy and/or psytrance will do for now.

 

 

1. Machu Picchu starts with a unique blend of ambient, atmopheric sounds. The Terrence McKenna sample I could do without, primarilly because I've heard him so many times in so many albums. The artist keeps him to a minimal in the very beginning here. Following samples are interesting and provoke attention. The beat soon kicks in and a mix of bizarre/strange sounds compose a structure. The album has many of these unique aspects that I can't say I love or hate; they just are and in a sense showcase the artists mystic/modern style. It makes good backdrop but it isn't until around 2:07, with a more ear friendly sound that hooks me. Suddenly all of the strange background textures make sense in a weird twisted kind of way; the song gets better, more psychedelic as it moves forward. I'm not completely captivated yet though. Cool track. B

 

2. Dancing Samadhi is another interesting track, darker, more tribal sounding but not/never becoming to tribal trance. The thumping, driving drums are good, combined with piano and/or various instruments. A sound around 1:32 is catchy; the bubbly song moves forward with a llittle attitude which I like. The laugh is cool too. What I don't care for is the melody/sound that begins around 1:53 and goes until 2:30 because I have heard this sound before, as if it's from another song, movie, or something. I believe to know that sound too well and wish the artist created and/or chose something else. The sounds that accompany it are really good though, creating a hauntingly playful, dynamic, and musical treat. B+

 

3. Truth And Beauty has some beautiful melodies which go well with the ever changing backgrounds. The second half of the song sounds completely varied and different; both parts have very good sound/melody work and hooks. This is another solid number. B+

 

4. Across The Universe starts great. Wow. Now this is more of what I like. The beginning is dark and haunting, atmospheric. The melodic elements are like angel particles, elegant bits sprinkled over the twisted screams and eerie atmosphere. The beat changes up; an interesting mix of sounds arrive around 2:00, and I'm not sure where this western-esque part is going, though the the rhythm is soon joined with a sound, creating emphasis to the darker elements, a smart move. A unique interlude hovers around 3:00. The howling effects are well placed, altered, distorted. As we reach the center, new formations of sounds mix with previous areas, some now removed, creating an intricate, non-linear approach that's gripping. I wasn't a big fan of the initial melody in the first two minutes. An excellent part is when the beat is enhanced around 4:25. The section past that is dark and/or intense and engaging too. Great track! A-

 

5. This Is A Warning is another vibrantly layered, well done song with a wonderful sound fusion around 5:45 forward. I love the part from 5:53 to 5:50 and how that moves with various other sounds. The computer/robotic sound effects a la Electrypnose (2008 release but different in style and effect) are catchy. They add sweet textures to the dynamic sound art like water in the ocean in the sense they seem inseparable and flow extremely well. Excellent work. A-

 

6. Intergalactic is like a deep sea, submerged exposition. Traveling deep underwater into uncharted territory. Various melodies remind me of when the boy became particles, and was separated to atoms in the air from the classic original Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (1971) film. I'm referring to the melody work around 5:30 to 6:45, before it is barely audible and/or removed to accommodate new layers that strengthen the final third. This is a unique blend of explorative (experimental elements) psy music, delivered in an approach that rivals Eat Static's deep sea vehicle from their Back to Earth album in 2008. Interesting track. I enjoyed some of the others more but I like the creativity here. B+

 

7. I'm Just Amazed is a burst of adrenaline; a higher octane, well textured and psychedelic, determined beast trekking across the baron lands. This is a pretty cool, dark, aggressive, and danceable psy influenced and/or psytrance number. The variation of sounds as it progresses prevents it from dipping into repetition, making this smarter, more interesting than many dance friendly stompers out there. Think Merr0w's Mind Blowing; that's what this track reminds me of in the sense it's strong and has a hard kick drum throughout. I think that a more uncompromising approach to having more energetic melodies would have enhanced this song for the better though. For instance, the part around 4:35 and again around 4:45 is really good; the part around 5:00 is great too, very climactic. But the wavering, lower sound/melody that enters around 5:15 is not nearly as effective to the driving rhythm of the whole. While some people may like this, I feel that this sound, though fairly short in duration, distracts (takes away) from the high octane energy and intensity of the song because it stands out so much, and seems out of place, as it goes higher/lower in pitch. I'm glad when it exits, and when the song continues. Otherwise than that part, the song is very well done. B+

 

8. White Magik returns to more psychedelic, playful, computer background, wild/fun, unpredictable and CATCHY sound work. I really like the musical development from the first to second minute. The following is great too, building and developing, adding more layers, enhancing the rhythm with more delectable sounds. A voice sample arrives around 4:50; the interlude is interesting but I would let go of McKenna samples in the future, as they've been done so frequently in the past and kind of hit an exhaustion peek, in my opinion. That said, the rest of the track is good/great, offering a complex fusion reflecting an extremely creative, smart, and chaotic (in a good way), visual mind. A-

 

9. Atlantis is interesting, a deep sea follow up to various, previous work; it creates a psychedelically closing uptempo number that is driving, less upbeat, and well done in this regard. This is one of those tracks that some will love/like or not be sure what to think, as I was for years with BofFB - Twin Sharkfins album. I would recommend this artist to keep feeding his passion though, because he's very talented. Again, I'm not sure how to rate some of these though they seem to qualify greatness, so give me some breathing space with the grades. The intricacy and innovation of this alone appears solid and I'm hooked enough, intrigued to hear the album yet again. B+

 

 

In conclusion, this is a very musical release, given for free to those who want to hear it for themselves. I tried several times earlier in 2009; the unique/artistic style sounded so foreign to me initially that I wasn't sure what to think of it as a whole. I wasn't sure how to write a review, as this has happened to me before (took me years to finally review Hux Flux - Cryptic Crunch); I prefer not to give an album an A just for being innovative and different. So while it's subjective to say, I decided to do my best to compare the tracks to themselves in this style and to my ears. An album that occasionally comes to my mind when listening to this, though this is different in style/sound, is Talpa - The Art of Being Non in the sense this takes risks, gets playful, wild, musically inventive, twisted, humorous, driving, and unexpected/dark, and unpredictable, showcasing various moments of beauty around a psy influenced orchestra. This artist's passion and fun, his personality seems to really cross over into certain tracks and it's fun to be exposed to the creativity. A gripe is tha st once in a while, the track has a really tasty texture going and the artist experiments over that with sometimes great, and other times ( with a strange, low sound or two) not as delectable results. Such moments distract me from the exciting state I'm in, but in general many of the lower sounds are important in that they're often well utilized and compliment the medium/higher sounds. This is the type of album that one must hear to decide what he or she feels, as it's different from all albums I've heard. For me, some of the tracks are appear creative/unique for being such while others, to me at least, are both creative, gripping, and enjoyable throughout. But the artistic approach in tracks will likely cause difference in favorites, as no song has been watered down to sound general or mainstream. Initiation is an interesting release, and while I can't say people will like/love it right away, I can't help but feel that it's one of the most innovative and solid little gems to come a long in a while.

 

 

This grade is subject to change (from me at least) but I want to bring attention to an album that deserves to be heard by more listeners, as this is one of the most unique and original releases that I have so far heard in 2009. Nonetheless, the album may take time to grow on the general listener as what happened with me.

 

 

B+

 

 

The album is free to download and/or buy: see above links.

[Xamanist]

Thank you so much for the amazing review, Jon Cocco!

You really got it, my goals, my visions and my music

 

These tracks are really diferent from each other because they were started at very diferent times, between 2000 and 2005.

I listened to all my previous work and rearranged it with my 2008 ears

This album represents my quest to learn all the subtle realms of psytrance and to seek my sound and vision.

Maybe in the future I'll bring all these experiences together into a more uniform sound... or maybe not, ehehe, I like to experiment a lot!

 

Peace, Love and creative Music!

[Xamanist]

more reviews?

[sickdogs]

Haha not really a review, but just wanted to drop by and say how much I love this release. Keep it up

[Xamanist]

Haha not really a review, but just wanted to drop by and say how much I love this release. Keep it up

 

Thanks, sickdogs!

New music is being born in the lab

 

Peace & Light