Afgin - Eternal Freedom

Suntrip Records: 2021

Speaking of artists who dropped an album during Suntrip's formative era, then seemingly disappeared for a decade after, here's Afgin again. True, he emerged at the tail-end of that first wave, but releasing Astral Experience around the same time Filteria and E-Mantra were releasing records ain't nothing to sneeze at. Merr0w too, I guess, Born Underwater's mermaid forever etched into the annals of unique Suntrip covers. (don't know anything about Radical Distortion's Psychedelic Dreams - the 'P's are still a long ways down in my current queue).

Okay, comparing Afgin to Khetzal is silly, and it's not like Elad was as quiet as Matthieu throughout the 2010s. True, Emotional Peaks was quite the departure from neo-goa, instead getting its toes wet with regular ol' progressive trance, what with the breakdowns and diddly piano bits and basslines that have actual chord progressions, not just key changes. Look, I like you, goa trance, I really do, but man, you could use more dynamism in your low-ends, even just once. I mean, it works for the prog-psy guys, so why not you?

Anyhow, whether Emotional Peaks was intended as a deliberate appeal to the Trance Family that failed, or just a passing fancy on Afgin's part, it cannot be denied that it curtailed whatever production momentum he had entering the '10s. He pretty much spent the rest of the decade on the DJ circuit, which is where he probably would have stayed had a pesky little pandemic not interrupted the clubbing sector something fierce. Can't tour festivals for a spell? Welp, may as well hunker down in a studio and crank out a few tunes, see where the inspiration takes you, and wouldn't you know it, there's a whole album's worth here. Maybe give the Suntrip lads a call, whether they're interested in some more material.

Right, I'm just forming conjecture based on little more than what Lord Discogs tells me. Still, it's funny how all these seemingly dormant neo-goa artists suddenly re-emerged at the turn of the '20s.

That all said, is Afgin's Eternal Freedom any good? Well, I like it better than his Astral Experience, if that helps. Not that I felt his first Suntrip CD was bad or anything, but it didn't really leap out at me as anything more than an Astral Projection nod, fairly standard fare as far as retro-goa acts were concerned. This one has that too, with plenty of acid to spare, but holy cow, th'ar be basslines here! It's like Elad's taken the best elements of his progressive trance tunes, and fused them with your regular wiggly, squiggly, ultra-punchy psychedelic Suntrip stylee. Chord progressions, oh so sweet chord progressions!

Okay, it's not in every track, acid-drenched goa still the dominant strain of trance we're hearing here. Still, if you don't mind a little of the classic progressive in your diet, final track Reaching Sunrise is a tasty morsel to end on, plucky synth breakdown and all. Reach for those lasers, crusties!

Artifact303 - Back To Space

Suntrip Records: 2011

Welp, here we go again with another Suntrip CD. No sense beating around the bush, let's get this over with.

The opening track Magnetic Fields doesn't waste any time giving us some solid music. The establishing sounds are nicely spaced out, the acid laid out with finesse, and the supporting squiggly sounds are tasteful. By the time the driving synth leads emerge, this tune is well into high gear, and gosh darn it, it just keeps building that energy, and I'm somehow more hype for another Suntrip CD than I've been in a while! Wait, wasn't I feeling kinda' 'meh' going in? How did my mood do a complete one-eighty in a mere five minutes? Holy cow, Magnetic Fields is awesome!

And yet, I can't help but have a bit of trepidation in my quick enthusiasm. Oh no, is Back To Space gonna' be one of those albums, with too much of a good thing? I've heard a couple out of Suntrip like that already, artists who know how to craft a solid tune, but tend to repeat their formula for an album's duration, unfortunately leading to monotony. Well, I'll worry about that when I have to. For now, yeah, let's keep vibin' to that strong climax in the opening cut!

Okay, second track is another barn-burner, and holy shit, doesn't waste any time in getting to the dope. Then things take a turn for the... deeper? Trancier? Oh, wow, They Will Communicate actually sounds like regular ol' progressive trance – or at least a blend of goa and prog as potentially rinsed out by Paul Oakenfold when he used to do that. Yeah, the peak still rips pretty good, but it's not so tear-out as I typically hear from Suntrip artists. Heck, same as with For A Better World, the sort of psy regular trance jocks once wouldn't have much fear rinsing out.

We're at the mid-album, and I'm already rather impressed by what I've heard, and then Artifact303 does something I never would have dreamed any artist on this label would do: he changes tempo! Tropical Sunset drops the BPM several notches to groovy prog-psy levels and...

That's it. Back To Space is the best album I've heard out of this label, hands down.

I'm serious! For as much as I've generally enjoyed what I've heard thus far, each release tends to be rather samey, showing little in the way of variety or diversity. Which is fine, since Suntrip is very upfront about being a goa trance label through and through. That doesn't mean artists can't throw in a few dalliances, but few ever do.

Anyhow, the back-end of Back To Space gets back to the blistering psy and acid, but I'm already anxious to see what else this Artifact303 has done for Suntrip. According to his Discogs page... not a whole lot. In fact, this album seems to be about it. Wait, seriously, the best Suntrip record I've heard, and it was a one-and-done deal? How cruel!

Sykonee's 'Sportsing' Surveys: PAUL VAN DYK

For a time, Mister Mattias Paul stradled between two worlds within trance's domain, somehow existing at the crossroad between UK progressive elite and Dutch ultra-melodic bombast. It made him one of the scene's most popular producers and DJs, one I even fell sway to in his late '90s / early '00s heyday. As my interests wandered elsewhere, I lost touch with Paul van Dyk's output, but that didn't mean I hadn't kept tabs. Hell, some of TranceCritic's earliest internet infamy involved his projects! Still, his career trajectory didn't seem to be one I wanted to follow, so let him be.

Then he had his near-fatal stage accident, which I can't say personally shook me or anything, but did 'reconnect' me after a fashion, as shortly after, I heard he'd 'reconnected' with trance music as well. Well that's interesting, thought I, but was I really that curious to hear such a comeback? Not initially, but every so often, I'd replay some of his old music from 45 RPM and Seven Ways, leaving me to wonder, did I do myself a disservice in dismissing so much of his discography? Like, I hadn't heard Out There And Back since it came out, and never even gave Reflections a chance. Hmm, albums both new and old I should be checking out? Sounds like a prime candidate for a 'sportsing survey' to me!





















Looking back on this, I'm surprised how many times I name-dropped ATB. Is it because I did a survey of him as well, so he's just the freshest in my mind in referencing popular eurotrance producers? Maybe, though I noticed the Wonky Angle dude was making similar comparisons too. Not to mention Paul and Andre seemed to occupy the same space within DJMag's poll, no matter how high or low they placed. Methinks the two Germans should collaborate. I'm serious!

As for who's next, I'm going back to a poll on Mastodon before deciding. I've a good feeling I know who'll win it, but then I was totally wrong in who'd win in the last one. No way I could have predicted Cypress Hill and Paul van Dyk would tie!

John '00' Fleming - Progressive Euphoria (A 'Token Prog' Review)

Telstar TV: 2001

Bonus review – that time the biggest trance series in the land did an entire Token Prog Compilation! Yes, even the Euphoria series was not immune to the Great Prog Dominion of 2001, and so they set aside their usual roster of second tier Brit-jocks to recruit the ever-so-slightly more underground John 00 Fleming to teach the trance kids all about this new fangled progressive phenomenon. Of all the jocks we’ve featured, J00F is the only one still playing music in this vein, and not coincidentally he’s also the only one I could listen to in 2023 without wanting to shove a fork in my ear after 15 minutes. Positioning himself as the trance massive’s self-appointed gateway DJ to deeper sounds has paid career dividends for Worthing’s slightly pompous prodigal slaphead.

Seriously, get a load of these inlay notes! “If you are new to this scene, you have to listen to the music in a different way,” John mansplains, since “a lot of you may rarely go to an underground club”. This radical rewiring of your mind to accept dance music without a gigantic melody over the top of every tune is worth it in the end though, as “this music is more intelligent, and some of the complicated string arrangements have been compared to such all-time great composers as Mozart!” Sheesh. I also like how John promises to play you the versions that were “around on the underground scene way before their commercial release” and then promptly gaslights the listener by including the vocal mix of Cass & Slide’s Perception.

Jesting aside, this is really very good stuff from J00F. It has a few slightly more mainstream moments to build a bridge with the Gatecrasher kids (I’m looking at you, Storm and Jakatta), and because this is a Euphoria compilation it’s contractually bound to feature Matt Darey’s From Russia With Love in some form or other. But John also features some lesser known but top-notch prog tunes by the likes of Jay Welsh and Thomas Penton that came out on small labels and certainly weren’t big hits at the time, which shows he was doing his homework. CD1 is deeper and CD2 brings out the trancier end of the prog spectrum, prepping these kids for the time-honoured ways of the Global Undergrounds and Renaissance CDs they could move onto. Most didn’t, of course, but not for the want of J00F’s trying. This CD is an able rival to anything on those labels.

(Graphic design watch – as much teenage nostalgia as I derive from the iconic Euphoria logo, the overall sleeve is more “superclub supermarket CD” than gorgeous prog mimimalism. Bonus points though for making this the most grey and colourless cardboard sleeve in the entire series. If ever there was a visual metaphor for “put the glowsticks away”, you’re looking at it here.)

Cursory Second Disc Verdict: Not relevant here, for obvious reasons. Prog all the way home, and all the better for it.


[Sykonee Says: And that's a wrap on 'Token Prog'! Thanks to Jack for the fun little diversion from this blog's usual bollocks. Might there be more such mixes lurking out there for a revisit down the line? Or perhaps a whole new series where we force J' to review 'Token mnml' mixes from prog DJs, Clockwork Orange style? Oh c'mon, no one's that cruel.]

Armin van Buuren - 002 Basic Instinct (A 'Token Prog' Review)

United Recordings: 2001

And finally, Armin. It’s worth pointing out that in 2001, Armin was by far the least well known of these DJs. PVD, Oakey and Tiesto were all jostling in the Top 10 of the DJ Mag poll back when it had some connection to reality, and Ferry Corsten was sat at #19 despite being better known as a producer. Armin was a new entry on the list that year, and he still hadn’t had a mix CD released outside the Netherlands. Not until widespread broadband roll-out made Internet radio a big thing did his A State Of Trance show take him truly global.

Basic Instinct (which was kinda, sorta part of the ASOT series but before Armin had figured out how to brand it) was released in January 2001 and most of the tracks featured were released the previous year, and it shows. CD1 is prog alright, but it’s a much more banging big room strain of prog than the dark ‘n tribal stuff that would become so crushingly dominant just a few months later.

And y’know what? That’s very much a Good Thing, because the prog disc here is really good. The transitions are sometimes edited to make them a bit too abrupt for yer chin-stroking Global Underground connoisseur, but honestly I can’t fault how Armin put this together. The Argonaut’s Going Through is a perfect opener, low-key with a great sci-fi sample, and from there AVB builds quickly into some full-knacker peak time prog trance, featuring some of the finest trancey proggy cuts of the era from the likes of Lemon8, Starecase and Junkie XL.

And really, that’s the distinction. Like Oakey’s Another World, which I didn’t get to review, this CD is far better than the more dutiful 2001 Token Discs because it’s progressive trance rather than just progressive prog. It captures that shift where these guys sighed and said, “Okay fine, I’ll build up a set” in concession to prog scruples, but weren’t yet wanking around with tuneless tribal blah just to fit in. Funny how fast the club scene moved back then, that a mere twelve months could signify such a significant shift in sound.

Make no mistake, CD1 here would be CD2 on any of the Global Underground or Renaissance outings mixed by Seaman, Warren, Pappa and the like. It’s prog at its biggest and tranciest, but without ever falling into uplifting trance stoopidity. And honestly, if you’re going to buy a prog CD by Armin Van bloody Buuren, isn’t that what you’re after?

Cursory Second Disc Verdict: Not good. Not good at all. Cringey vocals, breakdowns longer than the Middle Ages and blaring Roland JP-8000 leads abound. It’s vaguely mindblowing that Armin can be so good on disc one and so bad on this disc.

What Did We Learn From All This? The general trend here is that the trancier these guys kept their “deep” disc, the better the results. Funny that. Improbably, it’s the Dutchmen Ferry and Armin who prog up best. If you want to hear the big trance boys at their least silly, their CDs are the place to go. Equally improbably, it’s Englishman Oakey who comes dead last, although he would have done a lot better had the Syko-lord allowed me to cover Another World again. Either way, the Great Prog Dominion fell off pretty swiftly after this, while trance got real bad almost as swiftly. For most of these guys, this was as respectable as they ever sounded. But hang around after the final credits, because there was one trance jock who jumped this bandwagon and never hopped back off…

Ferry Corsten / System F - Trance Nation 2001 (A 'Token Prog' Review)

Ministry Of Sound: 2001

[Sykonee Says: Shame the excellent Trance Nation America from Taylor and Jimmy Van M falls just outside the parameters of this series. Now there's a pair of CDs that deserves some recognition! Come to think of it, why haven't I plucked myself a proper copy of that by now? Time to get on it, methinks. Also, you can read Jack's thoughts on it direct on the Discogs page, if you're curious. Anyhow, onto the 'Token Prog']

Plot twist – it’s CD2! Yes, you didn’t expect the Trance Nation series to give up its first disc to any kind of halfway credible music, did ye? As a side-note, it’s kinda fascinating to go back to these CDs and contrast how the big trance jocks chose to market themselves. Oakenfold and Tiesto hammered the mix CD market hard, treating compilations the way bands treated albums. Meanwhile PVD avoided the format almost altogether, but released more actual albums than Plantpot and Ape Man combined, whereas Ferry was mostly happy to hitch a ride aboard one of the Ministry Of Sound’s most shamelessly commercial trance compilation series.

Accordingly, the Trance Nation outings were never really regarded as any kind of Serious Artistic Statement by Corsten – hell, I don’t think he ever primarily saw himself as a DJ anyway - so when he did come anywhere near a Token Prog Disc, it was more about The Ministry goading him with cattle prods into playing what was seen as commercially viable at the time.

(Also, y’know how I’ve been hyping up the graphic design of CDs from this period? Yeah… we need to talk about that. Trance Nation 2001 has one of the worst covers ever, pitched midway between health and safety signage, E-number-heavy fruit chew wrapper, and the carapace of some aggressively venomous insect. Even nostalgia can’t save this one.)

Because this is Trance Nation, the Token Prog Disc has to open with the most commercially successful prog tune ever, Touch Me, and because this is Trance Nation, it has to be pitched at +4%. The next track is the disc’s solitary concession to “tribal tech” seriousness, and then things get, well… really fun actually. As early as track three, Ferry’s dropping in some nasty warehouse-friendly acid lines courtesy of Lee Coombs, and shortly after he accelerates a pair of Bedrock productions and slams them together with the expert disdain of a Hollywood stunt driver.

Don’t get me wrong, there’s the odd bit of shite on here. Ferry’s own remix of Tony Walker is a load of cobblers, and I don’t care if Human Movement happens to be prog legend Marc Mitchell in disguise: Love Comes Again is still a horrendous slab of rotten cheddar and always has been. But of all the Token Prog Discs we’ve covered, this is by far the most boisterous and exciting, with cuts like the Trisco remix of Freet and Ferry’s own Needlejuice being the kind of jaw wobbling, face stroking, can-I-have-a-sip-of-your-water-mate bangers that rarely make it onto more high-minded Serious Artistic Statement prog mixes. The mixing also sounds just rough enough to be an actual turntable mix, which kinda adds to the whole “I just want to get out of here and cash my cheque” energy Ferry’s bringing. Two thumbs up.

Cursory First Disc Verdict: Completely terrible, but you already knew that. Cosmic Gate’s Firewire sitting side by side with novelty hard dance shit-hit How U Like Bass is one of humanity’s low points.

Paul van Dyk - The Politics Of Dancing (A 'Token Prog' Review)

Ministry Of Sound: 2001

[Sykonee Says: Wait a minute, I've already done a review of this one. Twice! Do we really need another? Well, considering the latter is a 'jokey' two-paragraphs long, and the former is a 4,000 word monstrosity that's so dry that it may as well be a 'Review Written In The Style Of Prog', maybe this deserves another kick at the can. Have at 'er, J'!]


Paul Van Dyk was rather anomalous amongst the big trance jocks in that he didn’t really do mix CDs. Indeed, The Politics Of Dancing was much-touted at the time as the first one he’d ever done, which means we’re supposedly to pretend his MFS showcase for X-Mix never happened. PVD upheld his part of that consensual hallucination by trying really hard to make TPOD stand out, out Sasha-ing Sasha by doing the whole “radically re-edit and remix everything” trick a few years before Involver. The inlay also contains a full page of cryptic gibberish where PVD artfully avoids explaining what “the politics of dancing” actually means. All very high concept.

While we’re at it, here’s another compilation sleeve that’s got all of that 2001 graphic design good stuff going on. Just pause for a moment and stare at a photo of that back cover with tracklist. It’s so beautifully clean it could be from the 1920s Bauhaus. Gotta appreciate Paul looking pensively monochrome in front of some limestone steps on the front too, like a politician holding a press conference to publicly apologise for sleeping with his secretary.

But nevermind that. We’re here to judge how well he jumped the bandwagon. This is an odd one, because everything is so extensively reworked (mainly by giving every tune the same kick/clap/bass combo PVD used on everything around this time) it sounds more like a PVD showcase than an overt Token Prog Disc. It starts out pretty good, with Ashtrax – Digital Reason being exactly the kind of atmospheric proggy trancer that these guys should have played more of. Even early on, the flow feels ultra-fiddly though, the studio’d-to-death nature of the mix stopping it from feeling like a real DJ set. Amazingly, this is the only place in the Token Prog Discs series we’ll hear IIO’s omnipresent Rapture, and I quite like the way PVD rebuilds it into a harder prog-acid stormer. Then there are more vocals. Lots more vocals.

Yeah, I dunno. This just doesn’t flow very well. A lot of stop-starting, a lot of breaks switching to 4/4 and back, and that damn PVD beat on nearly every single track. In the inlay, Van Dyk states that he doesn’t like doing studio mixes because he doesn’t have a crowd to vibe off, and it really shows here. By the time we get to his own Autumn, things are getting unapologetically trancey and there they’ll stay. I don’t know, I feel cheated. This is barely a bandwagon hop at all. Everything is kinda stripped down and proggy, but he’ll be winning absolutely no prog purist points for how naff a lot of this disc is. Another one of those 2001 hat tips to the zeitgeist that doesn’t really please either the trance tribes or the Bedrock hordes.

Cursory Second Disc Verdict: Paul’s having a lot more fun here, which means you will too. More bangers, less fluff: this is main room superclub trance done – mostly - very well.

DJ Tiësto - Revolution (A 'Token Prog' Review)

Virgin: 2001

Never heard of this one? Me neither, until I happened across it on Discogs. Tiesto already had a cottage industry of mix CDs to his name come 2001, with both his Magik and In Search Of Sunrise series in full flow, but most were only available in the UK on import and they were generally single-discers, which didn’t give much scope for including a Token Prog Disc. So Virgin Records cooked up Revolution to capitalise on his growing popularity in the UK market, including a full disc dedicated to that moody drummy stuff so beloved by the Britishers.

Now before we go on, I’d like to temporarily pause my pithy prog appraisal and point out just how much armour piercing nostalgia these 2001 CD sleeves give me. Look at that chunky sans-serif font type, the tasteful minimalist layout. Oh my God, the title even looks like a watermark. I’ve no doubt it’s because the design template is completely ripped off from Virgin’s Anthems series from the same era, which were some of the very first mix CDs I laid eyes on, but there’s something about the graphic design of this era that takes me right back.

Anyway. There’s something else we need to talk about here. It’s the mastering. Whoever mastered this CD fucked up biiiiig time, which is perhaps why it’s largely forgotten even amongst Tiesto’s fans. The whole thing is recorded in mono, seemingly from the bottom of a tin can, on the end of a bad phone line. On Mars. Which is a shame, because the Token Prog Disc here (titled Darkside) is actually pretty good. Not great, but very listenable.

Plantpot opens with his own remix of Delerium, because of course, and while the ultra-syrupy vocal stylings of Leigh Nash weren’t winning any prog cool points, the fact he cut this remix at 125bpm tells you which way the wind was blowing in clubland. And despite the “Darkside” moniker, CD1 is actually quite smooth early on, less about the pulverising tech trance of Lethal Industry or Flight 643 and more a grown up version of those cartoon magik pixies searching for their sunrises that made Tiesto his name, the likes of Golden Desert and Innocence being dreamy closing-credits trance that don’t make your eyes roll so violently that your sockets get friction burn.

Things start to pick up pace with Fred Numf’s remix of Lovin’, although you can tell it’s 2001 because Tiesto gets it out of the way before the big trancey bit really gets going. The second half is much more percussive and the bandwagon hop is finally in full flow. Things get progressively harder and less tuneful before climaxing with utter inevitability on the tribal drums and ethnic wailing of The Search. Just a shame the mastering takes most of the oomph out of these cuts.

Cursory Second Disc Verdict: Magik Seven on third hand cassette rip. Okay, the tracklist is slightly different, but another good reason why nobody remembers this compilation.

Various - Perfecto Presents... Paul Oakenfold: Ibiza (A 'Token Prog' Review)

Perfecto: 2001

First up to bat is the ape man himself, Lord Oakenfold. Oakey is a slight outlier on this series because he started the bandwagon hop earlier than his peers. Ever the savvy A&R man, he saw the way the wind was blowing a year before most in the trance scene, dabbling with a proggy first disc on both Perfecto Presents… Another World (only released in the US) and its sort-of sister Travelling (everywhere but the US) in 2000. Another World is easily the best of Oakey’s prog efforts, but the Sykonaut has already run the rule over that one, and my benevolent blog overlord demands a separate entry into the EMCritic archive. Gotta harvest those search engine clicks, y’all.

Instead I get to cover Perfecto Presents… Ibiza. It’s now 2001, and boy are we going full prog here. Another World and Travelling both had Token Prog Discs, but they were very much progressive trance. This, on the other hand, is prog at its most 2001. Prog as in “progressive nothing”. The big echoey tribal drums, pulsing basslines and resolute lack of melodic top end are all present and correct. But how well does the ape man ape the prog men?

Honestly, CD1 starts so hilariously over-proggy it’s almost parodic. The first track is eleven and a half minutes long, fer chrissake! It’s like Oakey is deliberately setting out to alienate his trance kiddy fanbase. By the time we reach the fourth tune (and I use the word in the loosest possible sense) things have become so soporific my mind had wandered to why Oakenfold decided to style this disc after Ibiza, given the totalitarian greyness of the music is more evocative of Watford on a damp Wednesday than the White Isle. And just when you thought things couldn’t get any less cheerful, in come Radiohead with Idioteque. Oh my.

Yes, it seems as well as the prog bandwagon jump, this compilation catches Oakenfold at the start of his attempted Serious Artist phase, with Radiohead, Depeche Mode, U2 and The Prodigy trying to mix up the club tunes with Proper Songs. We’re really getting peak pretentious Oakenfold here, on both discs. The middle of CD1 also tips its hat to 2001’s other big fad: “nu skool” breaks, which really doesn’t help lift the energy levels any. Finally some drive is injected by Arena – Transit, before Oakenfold loses interest in that tack and ends the disc with Narayan, which would have had more impact had Fat Of The Land not been rinsed to death by 2001.

We’re off to a good start here. And by good, I mean bad. This is really rubbish, whether you’re a glowstick brandisher or a prog purist. Maximum prog points, minimum enjoyment.

Cursory Second Disc Verdict: Honestly, still pretty proggy. Right up until it’s not. The fact PPK – ResuRection exists in the same region of the observable universe as CD1, never mind the same jewel case, is testament to the remarkable variety of the human condition.

Sykonee's 'Sportsing' Surveys: DELERIUM / CONJURE ONE

Ah, Delerium. Some love 'em. Some hate 'em. Some loved 'em before they hated 'em. Some didn't know they existed for a decade before coming to love 'em. A great many more are probably indifferent but know at least one or two of their songs - typically in a remixed fashion. Wherever you stand on their worth, it's undeniable the group - primarily helmed by Bill Leeb, with Rhys Fulber as his frequent fellow muse, and a whole gaggle of lady vocalists in later years, have done much in the worlds of musical scenes most would deem incompatible. Are they really so?

Yes, if you were to take their very earliest industrial and dark ambient records against their most recent ethereal dance-pop outings, you'd wonder how that link ever formed. Or at least I wondered. And with wonder comes an interest in exploring an entire discography. Buckle-up, me buckos, this one's a three decades spanning dive!





























That sure was a dive that felt longer than I anticipated - probably didn't help I took on an additional discography in the process. That'd be like if I'd done all the solo albums of the original Genesis band members along with that band's primary output! Felt like I'd have done Rhys dirty if I didn't include his stuff with Leeb's though: the two remain so synced with each other after all these years, and the two projects were relatively similar overall. Ooh, does this mean I'll be tackling all the other Leeb/Rhys projects out there? Front Line Assembly does have quite the extensive discography too, not to mention other, smaller outings like Synesthasia.

Hhmm, no, I need to listen to something a bit different for a while. How does New Order sound to y'all?

Various - In Trance We Trust Xtra Nordic Edition: DJ John Storm

In Trance We Trust: 2001

I've picked up In Trance We Trust CDs for a myriad of reasons: spiffy TranceCritic review, a string of gimmick reviews, a sense of OCD-induced completism. Oddly, and perhaps a bit sadly, I've seldom gotten one because it intrigued me. Y'know, that twinge of curiosity one feels glancing upon cover art, a list of names on the back you're unfamiliar with and wish to explore further. There was a little with some editions (shout out to In Trance We Trust 006, yo'!), but I'm eighteen CDs deep now and it remains a rare occurrence.

Not so with Xtra Nordic Edition. For a label that's always been well-regarded for its classy photos, this one struck out like few others (Ringworld?). I've made my love of frigid Arctic scenery quite known on this blog, so naturally a huge hunk of ice floating in the darkest waters gets my senses tingling. Will this be filled with frosty-cool trance music, some deep chill cuts you just wouldn't hear anywhere else but the Nordic regions of Europe? The Scandinavians were already making quite the rep' with their cosmic disco tunes, could we get something of similar ilk from DJ John Storm?

Haha, no, nothing of the sort. Rather, the early days of Black Hole Recordings – and specifically In Trance We Trust – had a kinda'-sorta' partnership going with the Planetary Consciousness label. Never mind the print was based out of Berlin, they seemed to have a tap on Nordic trance jocks, some of which helmed the early run of In Trance We Trust CDs. It wasn't long before Black Hole would stick with in-house talent, but those initial ties still lingered for a time, and with the Black Hole empire in rapid ascent by the year 2001, what harm in exporting the brand into lands where they already had a beachhead?

As for the actual mix... well, I like about half of it. I've no idea what kind of jock Oddgeir “John Storm” Kristensen is, because this is his only entry within Lord Discogs, though apparently went on to form a Norwegian rap group called Side Brok. In any case, I sense two sets out of Mr. Storm: the one where he has to play a bunch of the Dutchiest Dutch trance that ever Dutched out of Black Hole, and the set where he just bangs things out with some propah' tough tech-trance. The latter mostly comes care of names like Impact and Project 247, with tunes that fit that supposed In Trance We Trust manifesto of showcasing the harder side of the genre.

The other prominent tunes has Geert Huinink as a producer, five out of the twelve. Yeah, that Geert Huinink, so expect those kinds of breakdowns, with those orchestral swells. What's amusing though, is in final track Protuberance from Dawnseekers, as the breakdown reaches its Geertiest moment, Oddgeir cuts the track off and ends the set, denying the listener the expectant gratuitous build-up. Expert trolling there, my friends!

Banco de Gaia - Igizeh (20th Anniversary Edition)

Disco Gecko: 2020

I was hyped when Toby Marks started putting out 20th anniversary editions of his back-catalogue, but only for the first couple albums. As I only discovered Banco's music after the Last Train To Lhasa era, his early years had remained something of a mystery, a potential trove of unreleased alternates, versions, and remixes of tunes that don't get as much shine in modern years. By Big Men Cry though, I was consistently on the ball about Banco, so didn't miss out on much that I wasn't interested in to begin with. And to be blunt, the packages that were released for Big Men Cry and Magical Sounds... didn't look to enhance those albums beyond what I already got out of them. Thus I let them pass on by.

Igizeh's re-issue though, I was interested in this one. This album tends to get overlooked, the big-beat 'hit' How Much Reality Can You Take? overshadowing some of the best songs to ever emerge from the World Bank. Seti I remains a top class tribal opener, Obsidian a fun romp into trance's domain, while Ms. Folker's heart-wrenching go with Glove Puppet cuts like a knife through your soul. Meanwhile, though B2 and Gizeh may not be quite on part with similar tunes in Banco's catalogue, they're still solid entries into his ambient dub and epic jam lexicon. Even the 'lesser' tunes like Creme Egg, Fake It Till You Make It and Sixty Sixteen nicely round out the album experience. Yes, Igizeh has everything going for it that should have made it a Banco de Gaia classic, if not for one thing: the mixdown.

Granted, there's none of the dirty digitalness that marred You Are Here. However, it was rather muffled too, as though the microphones used to record in all these live settings simply couldn't pick up the performed music at its best. Surely a spiffy, modern, remastering of Igizeh would erase those limitations, give these songs the resonance they deserve? Well, there's more clarity in 20th Anniversary - I can pick out even more drumming than before! I still need to crank the volume a little extra though. Guess there's no getting around the quality of the source material.

But enough of that. The selling point of these anniversary editions has been the bonus content, and I was quite intrigued by what Igizeh's offered. Banco's drifting into proper band territory has made much of that music difficult to remix, likely the reason why Magical Sounds... featured mostly live versions instead. Not here though, every tune getting the remix treatment in some way. A couple I already have (ADF's go with Obsidian, Dreadzone's go on Glove Puppet, Jack Dangers' go on Reality), others are just dancier versions of the originals (Seti I, Creme Egg, Gizeh, B2). More interestingly, 100th Monkey's turns the Pink Floydy Fake It into prog-psy, while Andrew Heath radically alters Sixty Sixteen into his brand of minimalist ambient. It's like the rousing, climatic second half of the original never existed!

Way Out West - Way Out West

Deconstruction: 1997

Even if I came to the Way Out West party a bit later than others, I was still aware of breakout classics like The Gift and Ajare. Having gotten an enjoyable taste of their later productions, it's time I return to the source, their self-titled debut, for the full story. No longer another in a long line of 'whenever I get to it' cases, let's hear some vintage proggy-breaks action as it was blossoming. Throw this bad boy on the digital jukebox then!

Uh huh, uh huh... uh huh... ah, hmm. Umm... is it just me, or does this album sound a rather bit... cluttered?

I think the aforementioned tunes, plus Intensify, spoiled me because truth be told, I hadn't heard much else off this record. Am I once again dashing my expectations? I mean, I kinda' do get tracks of equal calibre, but there's a lack of polish I wasn't prepared for. It's like, Nick and Jody had heard what BT and Blue Amazon were doing, wanted to do the same, but over-stepped what they were actually capable of. They shot for 'immaculate brilliance' when all that was needed was 'damn fine great'.

Blue sets us off on a nice enough footing, more of a chill, Balearic opener with funky drumming, piano flourishes, and flange effects – nothing too overt. The Gift does its lovely little thing in bridging the realms of atmospheric jungle and Ibiza bliss (oh hi, Joanna Law, I remember you from that Coldcut set), then Domination gets this party properly started. It certainly aims at being an epic prog-house outing with many segments building upon the last, but I dunno, it feels like it does too much with all the samples, key changes, beat changes, breakdowns, bridges, and superfluous drippy water sounds.

And this permeates in the following clutch of tracks, such that I'm actually distracted by it rather than letting things flow as Way Out West mean them too. There are things I like in each of them: Dancehall Tornado has a nifty eerie segment towards its end; the piano bridge and vocal sample in Questions Never Answered is some of the best work I've heard from these chaps; the final stretch of Sequoia is prog-trance action at its finest. There's just so much else going on in these tracks that don't build to them in any significant way. If you need an example of where 'simpler is better', just gander at Ajare here, their peppy prog-house hit built around a singular, wonderful vocal sample. All the musical flourishes feed off it, rather than run off doing their own thing. Yes, even the record scratches!

Way Out West is a solid album, still among the best you're gonna' find in this era of progressive house/trance/breaks. It's only true fault is perhaps being a bit of a bandwagon jump of what was popular within those circles (including one (1) big-beat tune), but eh, history's proven that's the Way Out West manifesto anyway.

L.S.G. - The Best Of L.S.G. (The Singles Reworked)

Superstition: 2004

I can't recall if folks thought it at the time, but it did seem the L.S.G. era of Oliver Lieb's career was over. You usually don't do a 'Best Of' collection if you figure there's still more in the tank for a project. By the year 2004, however, the signs were aplenty that times were a'changein'. Chief among them, L.S.G. was soon to be homeless, the label Superstition unable to adapt with the ever-shifting trends in clubland. They tried getting in on that digital download thing with a run of L.S.G. singles re-issues, but it wasn't enough. Thus a finished album following The Hive went unreleased, and Lieb moved onto other things. Say, that minimal techno thing is catching on, how about that? Ah well, at least Superstition lived long enough to let Lieb do a 'remix album' of all the tunes that helped make the label one of trance's taste-makers of the '90s.

And honestly, I don't think an L.S.G. 'best of' could have worked as anything other than a 'reworking' of all his singles. The easy, lazy thing to do would be to just slap them all on a disc, maybe force a continuous mix out of it, and call it a day, but ol' Oliver had taken the project through many different paths over the decade of its existence. How could one's muse be satisfied with how the original works sounded after gaining so much experience in the studio since? I'm sure ideas and re-imaginings had been sloshing in his brain for a while (especially during the Into Deep sessions, if the final result is any indication), forming sonic links and chains among his various tracks. True, there's always been signature markers that let you know you're dealing with a Lieb production (the gated synths, the impeccable drum programming, those claps), but why not sum it all up in one uber-album retrospective?

Folly for me, I didn't 'get it' when I first threw on The Singles Reworked. Maybe I was more enamoured by the second disc holding all those non-album L.S.G. tunes, in my clutches for the first time and all (Hearts! Transmutation! Blueprint! Fragile (Gravity Fools The Magician Remix By Vapourspace)...?). Or maybe I was just so unfamiliar with all the reworked tunes that I couldn't appreciate the changes. Aside from My Time Is Yours, The Train Of Thought and Netherworld, none had appeared on an L.S.G. album. For a while, I thought it all cool and neat sounding, but cribbing just a bit too much from Into Deep's aesthetic to stand out as its own unique thing. As I said, folly for me.

But yes, time and repeated plays has provided enough perspective such that I hear The Singles Reworked as more than just a 'best of' remix record. It truly is an album unto itself, just with familiar melodies in a different context from their original conception. Think of it like an 'unplugged' session, except still very much plugged in.

Various - Bedrock: Jimmy Van M

Pioneer: 2001

It was a few years after their releases that I gathered the subsequent entries of the Bedrock series, though not for a lack of interest. Jimmy Van M? Chris Fortier? Holy cow, those are, like, my two favouritist prog DJs that hardly anyone knows about! Absolutely I want to hear new mixes from them, especially with that bullet-proof Bedrock brand behind them, but why can't I find these CDs on the store shelves? Digweed's set was all over the place, so why not these?

Oh, Ultra Records was no longer distributing Bedrock Records material, that's why. Instead, Pioneer picked up the rights, which is bizarre because this label started out as a LaserDisc distributor, and was mostly known for Japanese releases and imports at this stage of its lifespan (so many anime soundtracks ...just so many). Its story grows more convoluted after, but I'm here to review two-decade old prog mixes, not recap tumultuous label histories. Just bizarre that it would pick up Bedrock distribution though.

Anyhow, difficulty in attaining these mixes became a moot point when I took my first dips into the Amazon, and upon firing up that Jimmy Van M mix, it was like heavenly mana falling into my ears, the sort of prog that did me no wrong. Okay, that wasn't my initial impression, as it didn't quite win me over so instantly as his Trance Nation: America outing. But man, once this one clicked after a couple plays, it became my favourite of the Bedrock series (uh, spoiler for Chris Fortier's entry?).

CD 1 is all dark prog. Oooh, that oh-so tasty deep, dubby, chugging sound that had such a brief but glorious run in the early '00s. Moshic is here! Floppy Sounds is here! Creamer & K are here! Bill Hamel is here (with Andy Moor!). Steve Porter is here (with the rub on Trancentral Station's Mothership). And... Minimalistix' Struggle For Pleasure (Filterheadz Remix) is here? Ah, it's the last track of this disc, a nice little melodic number to end the CD on after all that sweaty, primal business that preceded it. About the only criticism I might throw to this disc is it's only ten tracks long, but eh, prog, amirite?

CD 2 also is but ten tracks long, and two of those are different versions of Solid Sessions' Janiero played together for a fifteen-minute outing (yes, Jimmy was a disciple of Sasha & Digweed, why do you ask?). What always confounds me about this set is how, despite a rather Balearic opening to the disc, Mr. Van M somehow steers things towards Nuclear Ramjet's Deep Blue by track nine, a tune that treads as close to the realms of psy-trance as prog DJs ever dared to go. Such a dope tune too (that breakbeat breakdown!).

Listening to these sets reminds me how unfortunate it was that Jimmy made so few commercial mixes. I've heard them all now. What, he also did a collaborative one with Oliver Lieb in 2012? Uh...

Various - Bedrock: John Digweed

Ultra Records: 1999

Many folks consider this Digweed's proper debut solo DJ mix, which is funny considering how long he'd been spinning records up to that point. Heck, he'd just done a set for Global Underground the year prior, and a solo follow-up to his and Sasha's seminal Renaissance set half a decade earlier. Not to mention various odds and ends that slipped through the radar for various reasons. Most of those were in service of other brands though, but by the end of the '90s, Digweed was a brand unto himself. And what better time to expand that brand than by propping up his newer brand, the freshly minted label Bedrock.

Bedrock became a short-lived series itself, but this inaugural outing clearly overshadowed the follow-ups. When people think Bedrock, they think Digweed, and all the artists featured on his label were there because of his blessing keen sense of club weapons for the progressive elite. This was his opening statement for a new phase in his career, dictating where progressive house would go. Also, a shameless way to plug his new big single Heaven Scent to help launch the Bedrock brand proper-like. All the way at the end of the double-disc set. As if it didn't really fit with the new manifesto. Hmmm...

Forget Heaven Scent. What matters is all the music before it on that tasty CD2. Prog has plenty of criticisms, some of which rear their heads in this set (only ten tracks, what?), but I cannot deny the tunes included here do the business proper-like for my earholes. The opening track alone (Ba Ba (Human Movement Remix) from Pob & Taylor) gets on that hard, techy brand of prog that Steve Porter would launch a career from. The Bedrock rub on Heller & Farley's The Rising Sun practically defines the dark, chugging style that prog would build its reputation around (“deep, deep, dub”). And while it's no Breeder, Sandra Collins' Flutterby pulls closely enough from the the same tech-trance lane such that the sound gets its just representation in this set. Oh, and Markus Schulz is here too, his early Dakota track Swirl offering one of the few melodic moments. Guess Digweed needed something to make the anthemic melodies of Heaven Scent not seem as out of place.

All this gushing over CD2, but what about CD1? Yeah, about that. Two decades later, and with multiple attempts, including most recently, this one just doesn't stick in my head that well. It's the dreaded other critique against prog, its more vapourous tendencies for long stretches, and believe you me, this problem would persist in the following editions of Bedrock.

Maybe CD1 is just too sluggish compared to CD2, and thus always forgotten whenever I play them back-to-back. Oddly, the vocal stuff leaves the only impression, like in Moody from BPT, the Fluke-ish True from Morel, and the quaint robotic Hawkins-speak in We Are Connected from Jodi & Spesh. Who'd have thought vocals would be the best part?

Blue Amazon - The Javelin

Jackpot: 1997

(a Patreon Request from Omskbird)

The only other 'epic house' album you're supposed to have, even if you're not a fan of 'epic house', since between this and BT's Ima, there were no other such LPs. You'd think with two years separating them, someone else might have had their hand at style-biting the sound that Sasha was rinsing out, but album release dates can be deceiving. Seems Jackpot, the label behind The Javelin, sat on Blue Amazon's debut a tad longer than Lee Softley and co. wanted, the record almost ready to go in conjunction with BT's debut. Instead, by the time 1997 rolled around, clubland was already moving onto the Next Hotness, when Next Hotnesses were emerging at a monthly clip.

Seriously, it's unfathomable how fast things evolved back in the '90s, and I say this as someone who lived through it! How can a record that sounded cutting edge in '95 be showing signs of dustiness when it was finally released in '97? Can you imagine something similar playing out in the last decade? You'd think with the infinite tools available and infinite means of distribution, we'd be hearing tons of new and exciting developments in electronic music almost weekly now. Instead folks keep returning to formulas that worked in the past, nurturing them to the point of perfection such that we don't need no new-fangled ideas sullying up a good thing. Like, they tried forcing it back in the '00s, and look how that turned out.

Calling The Javelin “dated by '97” is probably a gross overstatement, but it's hard not to draw comparisons to BT's Ima with this album. Then, when you stack it against BT's 1997 outing of ESCM, you can hear what I mean by club music, erm, progressing rapidly. Then again, BT always was leaps beyond his contemporaries.

Anyhow, what made Blue Amazon's singles such huge hits within prog circles (re: favs of Sasha) was how all-encompassing of 'the journey' they were. Tunes breaking double-digits in runtime, with lengthy, rhythm-heavy builds to endorphin-rushing climaxes filled with pianos and synth riffs and ear-wormy breathy vocals. Man, as the first track plays out, I couldn't wait for my headspace to sing “And then the rain falls” again, such a-

No, wait, this is a different track. Sorry, I meant when the second track plays, I couldn't wait to sing “And then the rain falls” again, where- Wait, it's not this one either? Ah, the one after The Runner then, that's the one that- Huh, not this one either. Wait, it's not until the last track we get And Then The Rain Falls?

So if there's any real criticism to be had with The Javelin, it's that for as wonderfully written and produced these tracks are, Blue Amazon essentially has only one song in their repertoire. It's a hum-dinger of a tune, with some aesthetic differences between each iteration (ooh, such gnarly acid in No Other Love!). When every track has me subconsciously anticipating “And then the rain falls”, however, well...

ACE TRACKS: July 2019

You know what I miss? Naps. Don't get me wrong, the way my current work schedule has turned out is rather nice overall, becoming part of the 9-5 demographic without any of the headaches it seems to create. Getting home at such a time, however, means if I lay down, it's certainly lights out until the middle of the night, from which I'll be up way too long in the pre-dawn hours. What am I gonna' do in that time, go for a swim at the local pool with the elderly? (hhmmm...) My old 6-2 workshift was perfect for catching an early evening snooze without worry about oversleeping.

Does this mean I'm destined for another burnout all too soon? Or should I sneak some naptime while I'm at work? Like, I probably could get away with it, me being my own boss with a serious downswing of activity towards the end of my shift. No one has to know I'm sleeping on company time, not even the ones who somehow stumble upon this blog. Mwahaha!! Ah, hm, here's some ACE TRACKS from July anyway.


Full track list here


MISSING ALBUMS:
DJ 3000 - Sälis
Dr. Atmo - Quiet Life
Cosmic Replicant - Processes
Subotika - Panonija
Opium - Pain(t)
Pleq - Our Words Are Frozen

Percentage Of Hip-Hop: 0%
Percentage Of Rock: 14%
Most “WTF?” Track: The dark ambient stuff. Far too aggro for all the chill vibes on this playlist. Yes, even dubstep and Billy Idol are comparatively chill to SantAAgostino.

Not as ambient as it could have been, what with so many albums missing from this playlist, but it still sounds rather singular throughout. Or at least, having large chunks devoted so certain genres/artists rather than a mix of everything. Surprised by the weak Spotify game this time out. Maybe it's time to look into Deezer?

BT - Movement In Still Life

ZYX Music: 2000

(a Patreon Reqest from Omskbird)

And thank goodness it's a request for the original UK version, not the busted-ass American version. I've let my dislike of Movement In Still Life: US Edition known, but I cannot reiterate enough just how much that version turned me off from BT's future output. Like, the cover shot alone felt confrontational to a connoisseur of the clubbing underground, Mr. Transeau pretty-boy mugging suggesting a run with boy-band fame and fortune. Throw in the fact tracks were neutered to pop-friendly lengths, plus lacking two of my hotly anticipated BT cuts at the time (Hip Hop Phenomenon and Fibonacci Sequence), and you can understand my utter bewilderment after my first playthrough. For a release that was clearly executive managed for max North American appeal, it had the exact opposite effect for yours truly. Epic fail, yo'!

When I heard an alternate, original version existed across the Atlantic Ocean, I knew, unheard, it was the superior cut of the album. Then global internet forums compared notes, confirming my suspicion of just how shafted American BT fans were on Movement In Still Life: Inferior Version. Unless some of y'all liked the US edition. For the love of me, I cannot imagine why. Too much awesome to handle in the UK edition?

That all said, it was many years before I got around to hearing Movement In Still Life: UK Edition, for no better reason than it was too expensive to import. In fact, it wasn't until I started revisiting some of BT's earlier albums for this blog that I finally checked it out, and wouldn't you know it, I quite enjoyed what I heard! Hip Hop Phenomenon is here! The Sasha collaboration Ride is here! The Paul van Dyk collaboration Namistai is here! The full-length versions of Godspeed, Dreaming, Mercury & Solace and Running Down The Way Up are here! Andy Gray is here! Wait, what?

Superior songs and superior cuts of tracks notwithstanding, what makes Movement In Still Life: Superior Version so good is the flowing sequencing of tunes, of which the Paul Oakenfold co-producer had a helping hand in. It supplies a fun opening of various breakbeat tuneage, nu-skool still in its infancy and BT still showing restraint in how overtly complicated he made his productions. Following Hip Hop Phenomenon, we're served up some requisite classy progressive trance, most of which holds up to this day. Fine, I'll admit I was never that big a fan of Dreaming, but mostly due to how overplayed the generic trance remixes were – the nine-minute cut here at least provides some stylish detours throughout its runtime. The final couple tracks do a decent job winding things down, with Hybrid lending their breakbeat science to BT's non-abusive stutter effects, and Satellite serving as a nice, mellow chill-hop closer.

Overall, Movement In Still Life: The True Version does a good job capturing what was popping in UK clubland at the turn of the century. Perhaps not as adventurous as ESCM was, but certainly more consistent throughout.

Paul Oakenfold - Perfecto Presents Another World

Thrive Records: 2000

Rinsing out another clutch of trance anthems wasn't exciting anymore. Everyone was doing it, CDs of the stuff flooding the shelves of all your major retailers. No, to stand out from an over-saturated market, you had to get conceptual in your mixes, add a unique spin on your art of spin.

This was no doubt running through Oakenfold's head as his brand had reached near global peak. Yes, he was the highest paid DJ in the world, but those two lads, Sasha & Digweed, kept getting the highest critical praises. How could it be, Paul had to wonder, why they were seen as light years ahead of him? They'd both had DJ mixes out on superclub tie-ins (Renaissance, Cream), both had entries in the Global Underground series. Surely they were on the same level, right? No, because Sasha & Diggers still had the critically lauded conceptual Northern Exposure series, and Oakenfold had no such items to his brand, nor could he, Paul's skill as a DJ incapable of such immaculate sets. What do?

Do a conceptual mix his way, is what. People laugh at your mixing abilities? Then make a mix where mixing isn't a main focus at all, just track selection. And of those tracks, make sure you get some upfront tunes premiered, like Max Graham's Airtight, or Quiver's rub of Led Zeppelin's Babe I'm Gonna Leave You. Plus, folks seemed to love that Silence track on Northern Exposure: Expeditions, so include that too, but with a fresh remix from that new hotness Dutch guy named Tiësto. Finally, do something no one was doing in their commercial DJ mixes, and include transitional pieces featuring music from Bladerunner, Dead Can Dance, and that recent Al Pacino and Russell Crowe flick! Top that, Misters Coe and Digweed! Oh, c'mon, pay attention to me! I tried this time, really I did! There's even a long blend with Timo Maas' Ubik and L.S.G.'s Into Deep - surely enough for proper prog-props.

Actually, that's something that strikes me about Another World, just how much of the 'dark prog' sound is in this. Yeah, Oakenfold can't help himself in having some of them also feature operatic vocals or Balearic vibes, but tell me tunes like Skope's Back And Front or Lost It.Com's Animal couldn't fit in a Bedrock set too. And ooh, there's some proggy-breaks action in Brancaccio & Asher's Darker. Yeah, having pieces like The Host Of The Seraphim and Tears In The Rain may be obvious to connoisseurs of such music, but ain't no one playing them in 'radio sets' like Another World; and I quite like Lisa Gerrard's Sacrifice, thank you very much.

Frankly, I like a lot of this set, even the cheesier moments like Jan Johnston's Flesh and the silly 'interviews' praising Oakenfold. The music's top-notch throughout, while Oakenfold's weaknesses are played as strengths in his track arrangement. For a brief moment here, he finally seemed on par with the critical darlings of progressive trance. It was mostly downward after.