Thoughts about Psy-trance genres

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quest
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Re: Thoughts about Psy-trance genres

Post by quest »

TomasHD wrote:
Man, I love techtrance and X-Dream is one of my all time favorites:

youtu.be/H9KX0CoMUOk
Aww yeah! Damn I saw X-Dream in Tokyo for NYE 2010 and they still threw down after all these years. It's funny to remember a time when there wasn't this massive barrier between psy and techno. What's more is, I think the lack of barrier was what made for so much innovation and distinctiveness in the various tracks by the top artists of that crossover genre. It's still more inspiring to me than all the "basic techno" you still hear these days, that IMHO is just as formulaic as psy has become.

I think it's what I miss most about that era, there was a real community that didn't limit themselves to just one genre or the other (even if they had their preferences).

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Re: Thoughts about Psy-trance genres

Post by Lost to the Void »

mainst09 wrote:
Lost to the Void wrote: I listen to a shit ton of music, from contemporary orchestral to electro, bluegrass to industrial, I'm not some idiot who can't spot differences in music.
I (we all here) have not failed to understand anything.
Every time you have talked about pay in this forum you link stuff, and every time it sounds the same as 90s psy.
I mean, you call it "dark" Psy, but it sounds like...... Psytrance.
As does hi-tech.
I mean, they might use slightly different instrumentation.
But its like playing old rockabilly and using a gretsch guitar instead of telecaster.
It's still the same shit.

To answer this
And sorry but you really do need to listen to a wide variety of artists to spot the differences,

like i said before when i first started listening it was all the same to me nothing made sense

but after some time i started to understand what they're doing and this is why i always say this stuff is not all the same.
I'll break it down.
I've listened to all the artists you linked. It all sounded like 90s Psy.

It all makes perfect sense to me.

I can completely hear and understand what they are doing, it's mainly arpeggios, staccato riffs, lots of delay, lots of filter sweeping.

Exactly the same methods and techniques and sounds that have been used in Psy forever and ever from here to eternity.

Unless you can demonstrate otherwise.

Ok you had me mate, sometimes i forget most users here have way more musical experience than me, taste is a big factor indeed!!
Not slating the music at all, I mean, I lost many hours spazzed out on serious LSD to parties on that shit, and I have a ton of psy in my record collection.
And there is no reason that people can`t discover it an be in to it, love it, devote themselves to it etc, but I feel it`s like a lot of sub-genres. Like Acid Techno for example (Or Dub techno perhaps) - so specific in how it sounds it painted itself in to a corner, in terms of progression.
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Re: Thoughts about Psy-trance genres

Post by Mono-xID »

But that's the thing with every sub genre.

Boom Bap sounds like Boom Bap, Sludge Core sounds like Sludge Core, NS Black Metal sounds like NS Black Metal, ScumPunk sounds like ScumPunk.

There have to be genre type borders to classify it as such.

It's all a matter of taste.

It's very rare that i discover something new that will totally blow me away these days.
Last time this happened was when I discovered ALL THEM WITCHES. Their mixture of Stoner Rock, Sludge, Doom, Psychedelic, Indie Rock and Southern Blues Rock is fairly unique. Every Album is a progression from the former.
Stunning live band as well and I can't understand why they are not bigger. I guess as soon as the hipsters discover them they will be.
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Re: Thoughts about Psy-trance genres

Post by Lost to the Void »

Mono-xID wrote:But that's the thing with every sub genre.

Boom Bap sounds like Boom Bap, Sludge Core sounds like Sludge Core, NS Black Metal sounds like NS Black Metal, ScumPunk sounds like ScumPunk.

There have to be genre type borders to classify it as such.

It's all a matter of taste.

It's very rare that i discover something new that will totally blow me away these days.
Last time this happened was when I discovered ALL THEM WITCHES. Their mixture of Stoner Rock, Sludge, Doom, Psychedelic, Indie Rock and Southern Blues Rock is fairly unique. Every Album is a progression from the former.
Stunning live band as well and I can't understand why they are not bigger. I guess as soon as the hipsters discover them they will be.
There don`t have to be genre borders though, people just like to put things in boxes, and then others conform to that by copying the sound, which is essentially what it is, people copying/emulating other peoples sound. Some do it slavishly, some do it creatively. Some sub genres have tighter definitions and boundaries than others.

Grunge, for example, was a sub genre of rock that had very wide walls and definitions.
Acid techno though, quite narrow, I mean it had to have 303`s in it, it had to be 140-145 bpm etc.
Industrial Metal was/is a fairly wide sub genre. Ministry don`t sound like NIN who don`t sound like Die Krupps.
It all depends on how narrow the definitions are, or at least how narrow people allow them to be (or allow themselves to be confined within).
I`m sure with psy trance people could do something generally new with it, blend in elements of bass music, dubstep, or whatever.
But they just don`t/aren`t. These trustafarian "counter culture" fucko`s are all conformists really :mrgreen:


As for new music, I discover new and amazing music all the time, always going to interesting gigs, not enough time or money to go to them all.
It all depends how willing you are to go out and look.
I`m kinda lucky in that new shit arrives on my doorstep via the mastering studio.

I recently discovered the whole Scottish Dark/Political Hip Hop movement. It`s fucking awesome.
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Re: Thoughts about Psy-trance genres

Post by msl »

Lost to the Void wrote:I`ll happily stroll around a fleuro`d up setup in a forest for an hour admiring the decor and lights with the missus going "ooh, pretty colours", but unless I`m on Fear and Loathing amounts of hallucinogens, I`m not going to stick around for the music, because it`s gone nowhere.

Yeah as an old friend amusingly calls them "dog on a string festivals". there's always one!


Regarding sub-genres; I met this really really hot girl a few years ago, we go on a date, she has it all, brains, looks, a job, a plot in a communal garden, a fucking VW campervan even! Did I mention she was hot?

Anyway, the convo goes like this:

Me: "So what music are you into"
Her: "Psy-trance"
Me: "Oh.. I see, ok, so like what kind, cause psy trance all kinda sounds the same to me"
Her: "Yeah I goto the festivals in europe a few times a year, its great fun. There's so many new genres"
Me: "Oh really like what"
Her: "Like dark psy, thats what I like its new and totally different"
Me: "Oh wow ok cool never heard it show me"

anyways she gives me a mix by the "best darkpsy dj in germany" apparently.

And.....

exactly the same shit, same as 1994 but with fucking sci-fi and horror movie samples sprinkled on top.

Suffice it to say I did not join her on her festival tour. No woman is worth that kinda aural torture.
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Re: Thoughts about Psy-trance genres

Post by [wesellboxes] »

Not my cup of tea at all, but some of you may enjoy this interview with Youth I've just chanced across.

https://nomorebigwheels.com/2018/01/22/ ... ith-youth/

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Re: Thoughts about Psy-trance genres

Post by Squill »

Lost to the Void wrote:
Mono-xID wrote:But that's the thing with every sub genre.

Boom Bap sounds like Boom Bap, Sludge Core sounds like Sludge Core, NS Black Metal sounds like NS Black Metal, ScumPunk sounds like ScumPunk.

There have to be genre type borders to classify it as such.

It's all a matter of taste.

It's very rare that i discover something new that will totally blow me away these days.
Last time this happened was when I discovered ALL THEM WITCHES. Their mixture of Stoner Rock, Sludge, Doom, Psychedelic, Indie Rock and Southern Blues Rock is fairly unique. Every Album is a progression from the former.
Stunning live band as well and I can't understand why they are not bigger. I guess as soon as the hipsters discover them they will be.
There don`t have to be genre borders though, people just like to put things in boxes, and then others conform to that by copying the sound, which is essentially what it is, people copying/emulating other peoples sound. Some do it slavishly, some do it creatively. Some sub genres have tighter definitions and boundaries than others.
Nail on the head with this one. Imo genre borders can hinder true creativity. Maybe i'm a bit young, but in the early 90's it seemed people didn't care as much about genres as they do now. Jam & Spoon's age of love for example, could classify that as trance or techno back then. If that was made today trance peeps would say its the farthest thing from trance, no supersaws or fat mid rolling basslines.

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Re: Thoughts about Psy-trance genres

Post by Barfunkel »

Squill wrote: Imo genre borders can hinder true creativity.
It can also work the other way, ie I know people who are against genres and try to make genreless music. The results are, putting it nicely, varied. I believe that if you're not a super talented and creative individual, you'll probably make better music if you follow some kind of a framework, ie. a genre.

Making genreless music can also be a bit of a cop out and people can hide their weaknesses with excuses. You know, if you make techno, for example, and it's pretty obvious that a track you made wouldn't work on the dancefloor and might even sound really horrible on a club sound system then you have nowhere to escape when people tell that your music needs work. If you make genreless music you can (and people actually often do, too in real life) always just say that it's meant to be sound that way.


At least from my experience, people who try to work outside of genres much more commonly do the above than create something really unique.
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Re: Thoughts about Psy-trance genres

Post by jordanneke »

Psy trance is like cider.

You try it when you are young. It knocks your socks off. You think it's the best thing ever until you wake up in a wooded area using your own vomit as a pillow, and someone else's vomit as a blanket.

They keep on making 'new' trendy ciders like pear and strongbow fruits, and that piss you put in a class with ice. But it's all still cider.

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Re: Thoughts about Psy-trance genres

Post by Amøbe »

Barfunkel wrote:
Squill wrote: Imo genre borders can hinder true creativity.
It can also work the other way, ie I know people who are against genres and try to make genreless music. The results are, putting it nicely, varied. I believe that if you're not a super talented and creative individual, you'll probably make better music if you follow some kind of a framework, ie. a genre.

Making genreless music can also be a bit of a cop out and people can hide their weaknesses with excuses. You know, if you make techno, for example, and it's pretty obvious that a track you made wouldn't work on the dancefloor and might even sound really horrible on a club sound system then you have nowhere to escape when people tell that your music needs work. If you make genreless music you can (and people actually often do, too in real life) always just say that it's meant to be sound that way.


At least from my experience, people who try to work outside of genres much more commonly do the above than create something really unique.
This.

I feel that most experimental music succeeds only when it's progressing from something (like somebody bastardizing a genre that they already master) instead of just being a walk into "unexplored territory" (which is also stupid because they usually end up making something that has already been done better by another person who took the first mentioned road)

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Re: Thoughts about Psy-trance genres

Post by Lost to the Void »

You don`t try to work outside of genre...
You just make music.
Literally all the great original music is this.
And you will fail a lot until something works.
If you are just geared towards nothing but results then staying within genre, or copying as I call it, is where you are left.
IT`s worth trying even if only to fail.

I hate how short sited techno people can be sometimes.
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Re: Thoughts about Psy-trance genres

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Lost to the Void wrote:You don`t try to work outside of genre...
You just make music.
Literally all the great original music is this.
And you will fail a lot until something works.
If you are just geared towards nothing but results then staying within genre, or copying as I call it, is where you are left.
IT`s worth trying even if only to fail.

I hate how short sited techno people can be sometimes.
If you're refering to me, then I think you misunderstood what I said.

If you look at people like Picasso or Miro, who definitely both pushed the boundaries, experimented and succeeded, they didn't start out experimenting (some of their earliest works is just technically very impressive and has nothing - stylistically speaking - to do with, what they ended up creating).

My point was that experimenting is very important, but it shouldn't be an excuse for not learning technique... if that makes sense? (I have a few friends who make sound art, and that's a community that is being populated too heavily by people who just wanted to be experimental artists and then they put some noisy stuff together... those people are also the ones who end up making bad experimentations, where as the one who are very skilled and capable musicians/sound designers/now-what-a-piece-of-art-can-do and decide to make noisy compositional stuff - or something else - are the ones who artistically speaking also succeed).

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Re: Thoughts about Psy-trance genres

Post by Lost to the Void »

Well of course it`s much easier to bend or break the rules if you understand them.
Otherwise you are just throwing mud at the wall to see what sticks..... (also a very common techno technique)
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Re: Thoughts about Psy-trance genres

Post by Squill »

Lost to the Void wrote:Well of course it`s much easier to bend or break the rules if you understand them.
Otherwise you are just throwing mud at the wall to see what sticks..... (also a very common techno technique)
Again agreed. Not saying go in there without any knowledge and punch keys or replace a 4x4 kick with a sample of Yoko Ono yelling. Must have some knowledge in music one way or another

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Re: Thoughts about Psy-trance genres

Post by Mattias »

jordanneke wrote:Psy trance is like cider.

You try it when you are young. It knocks your socks off. You think it's the best thing ever until you wake up in a wooded area using your own vomit as a pillow, and someone else's vomit as a blanket.

They keep on making 'new' trendy ciders like pear and strongbow fruits, and that piss you put in a class with ice. But it's all still cider.
Love that similitude haha
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Re: Thoughts about Psy-trance genres

Post by [wesellboxes] »

jordanneke wrote:Psy trance is like cider.

You try it when you are young. It knocks your socks off. You think it's the best thing ever until you wake up in a wooded area using your own vomit as a pillow, and someone else's vomit as a blanket.

They keep on making 'new' trendy ciders like pear and strongbow fruits, and that piss you put in a class with ice. But it's all still cider.
:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

Quality analogy and right on the button.

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Re: Thoughts about Psy-trance genres

Post by jordanneke »

msl wrote:


Regarding sub-genres; I met this really really hot girl a few years ago, we go on a date, she has it all, brains, looks, a job, a plot in a communal garden, a fucking VW campervan even! Did I mention she was hot?

....

Suffice it to say I did not join her on her festival tour. No woman is worth that kinda aural torture.
Dude, you must REALLY hate psy trance.

Kudos for sticking to your principles.... your 'not getting laid by a hot girl' principles.

Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit, when I was single, I probably would have pretended to like neo nazi gabba for a hot girl.

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Re: Thoughts about Psy-trance genres

Post by Lost to the Void »

jordanneke wrote:
msl wrote:


Regarding sub-genres; I met this really really hot girl a few years ago, we go on a date, she has it all, brains, looks, a job, a plot in a communal garden, a fucking VW campervan even! Did I mention she was hot?

....

Suffice it to say I did not join her on her festival tour. No woman is worth that kinda aural torture.
Dude, you must REALLY hate psy trance.

Kudos for sticking to your principles.... your 'not getting laid by a hot girl' principles.

Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit, when I was single, I probably would have pretended to like neo nazi gabba for a hot girl.
So you were a man-slut then.... Interesting.
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Re: Thoughts about Psy-trance genres

Post by jordanneke »

How very dare you.

WAS?

I still am.

Edit - In lieu of the current climate I must add, not in a Bill Cosby, Weinerstein, Kevin Rapey, ... any man in the media over the age of 50 type of way.

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Re: Thoughts about Psy-trance genres

Post by intrusav »

Wtf, you gave up a plot in a communal garden because of psytrance? That's crazy!!
I love psytrance but purely from the tiny nostalgia compartment in my head. That shit made it's mark in my innocent yoof ..


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