South African Psytrance.

[DorphonDalfir]

This is slowly becoming one of our biggest cultural exports and I'm beginning to think that this is the cutting edge sound of industrialised electronic music.

 

 

What do you think of the sequencing/processing?

 

There was a talk on this forum awhile ago about what constitutes a live set? These guys are a full on band with a bass guitarist, percussionist with drum pads, synth and guitarist...Watching them play that music on stage is incredible.

[Mook]

Thanks for sharing. It sounds very much like early infected mushroom to me. Great video though.

 

As far as far as South African Psytrance, I rather enjoy listening to Protoculture - can get a bit too cheesy (particularly the spoken samples) but the noises from the XT and JP8000 make up for it.

[greaseenvelope]

Great track and video. If a live band is playing this kind of music then all the better. I got tired of psytrance a few years back when my band was playing lots of gigs in chill tents at outdoor renegade shows in the Oregon wilderness, which there used to be a huge scene for around here. We played a 3 hour set for tripping kids at a Goa Gil event.. .. it was a fun time. The problem is that after our set we'd be trying to go to sleep and no matter where we put our tents it was just booming psytrance until 8 in the morning from the main area... got to the point that hearing those distinctive drum production tricks and the pacing particular to the style was totally maddening.

 

Live bands rule though.. they actually have to stop eventually. Plus the nuances of having a live drummer make all the difference. I'm interested in how the bass player gets that insane tone live.. seen a live drum and bass trio where the bassist had an impressive effects rig but that heavy psy-tone is some really weird {censored}. Saw Analog {censored} from Israel headline one of these events and they put on a great show, as did Double Dragon (currently from Japan).

[psychematic]

I dunno... seems pretty generic psytrance to me. Same galloping SH-101ish bassline and same squelchy Virus-ish lead tones. I finally caught the bass guitar plucks toward the end, which made me wish they were more prominent throughout the track. The drumming didn't stand out as a real kit either. Not enough risks taken... no expression of a live drummer going off. I'm sure live these guys could be fun... but there's nothing in this track that stands out that couldn't be accomplished with one guy with a laptop. Seems to me the live instruments are just a fun gimmick and has nothing to do with the actual music production.

 

And actually the synth lines are pretty freaking annoying. Psytrance can be so much better than this.

[controlvoltage]

Not bad, I say! I've noticed more of those little piano sounds/tight plucked strings/"ping" and "clink" noises in South African psytrance than in trance from other places. Just a random observation. Actually I will be getting my stomp on to some SA trance next weekend, when Artifakt from the timecode crew comes to visit the mountains of North Carolina. He'll be playing at our family's annual reunion party... by family I mean Touch Samadhi psytrance crew, southeastern USA. It should be a wicked party.

 

I get tired of the thump thump whackity whackity when I am listening as a bystander, especially by day three... that's not what it's for, after all. It is best experienced on the dance floor.

 

Nice link and since nobody's mentioned it, that's a fantastically well-filmed video.

[DorphonDalfir]

Oooh, Artifakt...His sets are incredible with a lot of new bits and pieces added to his live performance...He loves playing around with textured sounds creating a expansive, alien soundscape.

 

Zion Linguist, Dirty Motion, Hiyarant and Broken Toy are some other good SA acts to check out...More emphasis on a techy/dirty-future feel rather than organic hippie music.

[DorphonDalfir]

I dunno... seems pretty generic psytrance to me. Same galloping SH-101ish bassline and same squelchy Virus-ish lead tones. I finally caught the bass guitar plucks toward the end, which made me wish they were more prominent throughout the track. The drumming didn't stand out as a real kit either. Not enough risks taken... no expression of a live drummer going off. I'm sure live these guys could be fun... but there's nothing in this track that stands out that couldn't be accomplished with one guy with a laptop. Seems to me the live instruments are just a fun gimmick and has nothing to do with the actual music production. And actually the synth lines are pretty freaking annoying. Psytrance can be so much better than this.

 

I'm not sure what was used in studio, but I've seen them play live and it's a very, very tight with a lot of live instrumentation...Which is a lot more flexible than a guy with Ableton and a controller.