VA - Psychedelic Revolution; Compiled By Gnomes Of Kush

[Bill]

 

VA - Psychedelic Revolution

Compiled By Gnomes Of Kush

BMSS Records

 

Tracklist:

1. Sonic Entity - Disengage

2. ManMachine - Asceticism

3. Middle Mode - Sunrise

4. Nerso - Particles (Remix)

5. Kiva & Gnomes Of Kush - Modulated Mantras

6. Datacult - Afro Samurai

7. ManMadeMan - Traveling Light

8. Parallel Dialog - Disorder

9. Sideform - Vahana (Odiseo & Gandulk Remix)

 

To be honest, I did not expect much going in to this one but it has a few notable names and out of respect for those particular artists I gave it a listen.

 

Gnomes Of Kush, who compiled this thing, has done some wonderful work on the dub side of things even if I've never been a fan of what he has done in the progressive community. Here, just as expected, there is a lot of by-the-numbers progressive, not a whole lot of variety, very little in the way of surprises, almost pure vanilla psytrance.

 

For instance, if you like Sonic Entity or his full-length release "Altered Fiction" from earlier this year then you'll probably enjoy the "Disengage" opener. I, however, do not. It sounds like every other Sonic Entity track ever produced. This guy has a formula and he follows it by-the-book, where it sounds decent for the first couple of minutes and then gets predictable and dull pretty quickly.

 

A disappointing ManMachine track follows this up, again just very dull work, very progressive, very formulaic, it takes absolutely no chances. One would be better finding his Ovnimoon Records full-lengths for a better form of his progressive.

 

Gnomes Of Kush team up with Kiva for a good (almost great) outing, ManMadeMan are almost quite good on "Traveling Light" with the sounds being minimal, more techno-oriented and the Sideform closer is only great because once it is over there is no more to sit through.

 

Datacult's "Afro Samurai" is good on in the first go-around but loses its charm over repeat listens.

 

For the highlights things get into some great full-on territory where the engines rev quite beautifully and layers get pieced together quite professionally by two of the more capable producers in the progressive spectrum. Middle Mode, one of the reasons I picked up this collection, kill it on "Sunrise." Even when these dudes annoy me with their plodding pacing on most of the productions they create I am still extremely impressed with the levels and details they put into their work.

 

No difference here. In fact, I'm sure this will become one of my favorites from these young producers. The progressive side is still there in this piece but they flirt so heavily with full-on that everything moves at a great, crisp pace. And the levels, oh yes, they give some great depth to this one.

 

The other highlight belongs to progressive producer Nerso, a man who is no stranger to taking chances in his work. "Particles" is fantastic, another full-on type gem, perhaps not as impressive as the Middle Mode jewel but certainly a full level or two above most everything else here in terms of quality.

 

A "Psychedelic Revolution" this one is not. In fact, most of this is revolting because of how typical it all sounds. The real rebels in this one are Nerso and Middle Mode who revolt against the same-old, same-old of their peers.