GOA – 20 Years of Psychedelic Trance

By Tom Rom/Pascal Querner

This unique book about the Goatrance movement is an anthology of the international Goa and Psytrance generation. It is the first book that describes the scene as a whole. The articles are written by 41 insiders of the international Psytrance scene from five continents. The pictures originate from some of the best photographers globally. The book highlights the evolution of the scene in the last 20 years and looks ahead to the future. The book comes along with a DVD and a poster, together as deluxe version, and both book and DVD will also be available separately. Both products are contemporary documents of a generation and photographic and filmic masterpieces.

For the newcomer in the Psytrance scene, this easy-to-read book is a ticket to an world of music, mind, feeling and love in a unique common psy-universe. For the long-term Goa-trancer it will be a revelation of backgrounds of the scene, a diary of the personal evolution and a heart-moving must to complete und re-feel the individual history.

Facts:

The book will be published in English and German first, then also a Portugese and a Japanese edition is planned. Together with the book there will be published a DVD by Psynema/El Geko and a poster.

The editors gathered many renowned musicians, deco artists, painters, VJs and makers of the scene together to form a most comprehensive picture about the scene world-wide: Ananto, Artur da Silva, Brad Olsen, Charles de Ledesma, Christian Rätsch, Eyal Yankovich, Goa Gil, Gregory Sams, Gui Lotus, Hans Cousto, Kai Mathesdorf, Katarina Bartovicova, Kei Fujishiro, Kranti Pessoa, Lui Raptor, Marc Brouard (Phoenix Firedancers), Martina Hoffmann, Omananda, Pascal Querner, Peter Ziegelmeier, Psynema, Rober Hannah Cleaver, Roger Liggenstorfer, Sam Chaishop, Scotty, Tom Rom, William Miller/Fish, Wolfgang Sterneck and some more.

The contents and articles cover a wide range of topics in the Psytrance scene: history and evolution, culture, spirituality and drugs, music, art, trance-dance and performances and scenes from all over the world as well as critical thoughts and previews to the future of Psytrance. Other important chapters are dedicated to the Cosmic Octave, shamanism, ecology and social codes unique to this scene. The book also provides glimpses to history, making and backgrounds of several festival such as the Boom, Voov/Vuuv, Burning Man, Solipse and the national scenes of Australia, Brazil, Israel, Japan, UK and many other regions of the world.



Psy Traveller

History of Psytrance

Psychedelic trance developed out of the early 1990s Goa Trance scene through the influence of artists such as Timeshard and Eat Static, both on the Planet Dog record label.

The first pure Psychedelic trance label was Dragonfly Records, formed by the artist and trance producer Martin "Youth" Glover (a former bassist for the band Killing Joke) in Brixton, London. For this he took advantage of the organization and the studio of his already existing label, Butterfly Records. It quickly became the center of the London Psychedelic trance scene. Raja Ram and Graham Wood first produced here as The Infinity Project. Simon Posford, who worked as a sound engineer at Butterfly, later released his legendary album, Twisted as Hallucinogen on Dragonfly. This album featured the classic track "LSD" featuring a voice sample from acid guru Ken Kesey. The first compilation from Dragonfly was released as a trance sampler and was soon followed by another compilation titled Project II Trance in August of 1993. These included work from such well-known artists as the French project Total Eclipse and Mandra Gora. In 1994 it released singles from Man With No Name, Prana, Ayahuasca, Slinky Wizard and Doof. The signature Order Odonata compilation was released the same year.

At this point the scene was growing rapidly and many new labels were created. Return To The Source, a party collective first appeared. Raja Ram and Graham Wood went on to found their own label, called TIP Records (now TIP World). Tsuyoshi Suzuki worked with John Perloff to create the Matsuri Productions label. Flying Rhino Records was established by James Monro, Dominic Lamb and George Barker (Slinky Wizard), who hired Sally Welch as manager. Simon Berry founded Platipus Records, who among other things, released the first vinyl by Technossomy.
It also out licensed the famous Robert Miles' "Children". Simon's own project, Union Jack released their morning trance album There will be no Armageddon in 1996, featuring well-known tracks such as "Red Herring", "Cactus" and "Two Full Moons and a Trout".

Around this time a new label emerged in UK. Some consider Blue Room Released to be of the most important, and unusual, labels in the Psychedelic trance genre. It was led by Simon Ghahary and had solid financial backing from a British loudspeaker company. Allegedly, Ghahary had free reign to spend the money as he saw fit, regardless of sales figures. This allowed Blue Room to move away from "classic" Goa trance into new, more experimental directions. Some of the most well-known artists today were signed and had their work distributed on the Blue Room Released label. Their first compilation was titled "Outside The Reactor" was released in April of 1995 and featured work from artists such as Total Eclipse, Har-El Prussky, and Voodoo People. Three of the most well known projects - Juno Reactor, Total Eclipse and The Infinity Project also released their debut albums that year. Soon the German project X-Dream started working with Blue Room as well, releasing their "The Frog" single and the highly influential Radio album. At its height, the label went on to release such works as Violent Relaxation by Total Eclipse, Juno Reactor's Bible of Dreams, Saafi Brothers' Mystic Cigarettes and Dragon Tales by Koxbox.

Despite being the center of production for Psychedelic trance in the mid 1990s, England had a very limited party scene. This mostly due to the Criminal Justice Bill and requirements for early closing hours in nightclubs. On the other hand, Germany had much more liberal laws, which in addition to the recent unification contributed to the development of the scene there. The German label Spirit Zone Records opened up in 1994, and ended up signing on many foreign artists such as The Infinity Project (UK), K.U.R.O. (Japan), Etnica (Italy), and Har-El Prussky (Israel). It was also the home label of many German artists such as Electric Universe, Star Sounds Orchestra and S.U.N. Project. France was also becoming an increasingly important location, with not only Total Eclipse, but the now famous projects like Talamasca and Transwave emerging.

Around 1997, the original Goa trance scene was undergoing hard times, especially in the UK. Sales dropped and many big labels such as Flying Rhino went bankrupt, while others had to reinvent themselves and emerge under a new name as did TIP World. The death of Goa trance was "officially" declared by Tsuyoshi Suzuki on his Let it RIP album, where the liner notes read "RIP: Mother Theresa, Princess Diana, William Burroughs, Goa trance."

The new sound of what would become the Psychedelic trance of today emerged at this time. It included elements of minimal and progressive trance, house, and techno, while focusing less on the original Goa melodies. Germany became the center of this movement in 1997 and 1998. Many Swedish artists also emerged playing a more progressive sound. The most successful and well known is Tomasz Balicki (Atmos). His track "Klein Aber Doctor" was the most successful release for Flying Rhino yet, which was in the process of restructuring. Even the Dragonfly label stated to switch to this new progressive sound, and Psychedelic trance was once again becoming popular. Debut releases from Atmos, Noma, S-Range and Son Kite only cemented this fact and made Sweden an important producer of psychedelic trance.

Soon Psychedelic trance was expanding rapidly once again, and for the first time differences became apparent in the music being produced in different countries. Parallel scenes also developed in countries like Israel, Germany, South Africa and Japan. There are also smaller, but active scenes in India, New Zealand, Australia, Brazil, Mexico, The Netherlands, Switzerland, Austria, Greece, Portugal, Finland, Russia, Ukraine, Thailand, Denmark, Poland, Canada and even the United States.

By: All About Trance

The History Of Goa Trance!

Goa trance is a form of electronic music and is a style of trance music. It originated in the late 1980s and early 1990s in the Indian state of Goa and is distinctive, as most forms of trance music were developed in Europe. Goa trance enjoyed the greater part of its success from around 1994--1998, and since then has dwindled significantly both in production and consumption, largely being replaced by its successor, psychedelic trance or Psytrance.

Goa trance is closely related to the emergence of Psytrance during the latter half of the 1990s and early 2000s, where the two genres mixed together. In popular culture, the distinction between the two genres remains largely a matter of opinion (they are considered by some to be synonymous; others say that Psytrance is more cyberneticamp and that Goa trance is more organic, and still others maintain that there is a clear difference between the two). These two are, however, quite sonically distinct from other forms of trance in both tonal quality, structure and feel. In many countries they are generally more underground and less commercial than other forms of trance. Among the first compilations or albums where Goa trance could be heard, as opposed to normal trance music, are Dragonfly Records Project II Trance and its successor Order Odonata.

History:
A hand-drawn flayer for a Goa trance party in Israel in 1990. Today Israel is one of the main producers of psychedelic trance and flayers have gotten more elaborate often featuring CG images. The music has its roots in the popularity of the Goa state near Fu's House in India in the late 1960s and early 1970s as a hippie mecca, and although musical developments were incorporating elements of industrial music and EBM with the spiritual culture in India throughout the 1980s, the actual Goa trance style did not officially appear until the early 1990s.

As the hippie tourist influx tapered off in the 1970s and 1980s, a core group remained in Goa, concentrating on developments in music along with other pursuits such as yoga and recreational drug use. The music that would eventually be known as Goa trance did not evolve from one single genre, but was inspired mainly by Industrial music/EBM like Front Line Assembly and A Split-Second, acid house (The KLF's What time is love? in particular) and psychedelic rock like Ozric Tentacles, Steve Hillage and Ash Ra Tempel. In addition to those, oriental tribal/ethnic music also became a source of inspiration, unsurprisingly considering that it was from Goa in the Orient that Goa trance originated.

A very early example (1974) of the relation between psy-rock and the music that would eventually be known as Goa trance is The Cosmic Jokers (a collaboration between Ash Ra Tempel and Klaus Schulze) highly experimental and psychedelic album Galactic Supermarket, which features occasional 4/4 rhythms intertwined with elements from psy-rock, early analogue synths and occasionally tribal-esque drum patterns.

The introduction of techno and its techniques to Goa led to what eventually became the Goa trance style; early pioneers included DJs Fred Disko, Laurent, Goa Gil, and Amsterdam Joey. Many parties (generally similar to raves but with a more mystic flavor, at least in early 1990s) in Goa revolve entirely around this genre of music. In other countries, Goa is also often played at raves, festivals and parties in conjunction with other styles of trance and techno.

Today, Goa trance has a significant following in Israel, brought to that country by former soldiers returning from recreational post-army trips to Goa in the early 1990s. A great deal of Goa trance (or now, more accurately, Psytrance) is now produced in Israel, but its production and consumption is a global phenomenon. New hot-spots today include Brazil, Japan, South Africa and Mexico.

The original Goa trance sound has undergone a great deal of other genres evolving from it since 1997. From 1997 till 2000 the Goa Trance scene was without any clear goal. Artists experimented in many ways from combining Goa trance with break beats to creating a blend of Goa trance and minimal techno (which later went on to become progressive/minimal Psytrance).

The main goal during this time was to experiment in new ways and create something different to the Goa trance sound that was so popular and widespread during the mid 90s. As a result, anything could be heard at a Goa trance party. After 2000, new styles were born, fixed and have survived until today, with some of them becoming commercialized and enjoying much more success in clubs, for example full-on Psytrance.