Psy Trance scene is concerned about nature

08 Jun 2011 1 Comment

by goamusic in Uncategorized Tags: beats, consciousness, dance, djs, drumming, electronic, global, goa, goagil, hippies, humanrights, india, life, love, morrison, music, native, nature, oneness, painting, peace, psy, psychedelics, psytrance, shaman, shamanism, shiva, soul, spiritual, substance, trance

Psychedelic trance, often referred to as psytrance, is a form of electronic music that developed from Goa trance in the early 1990s when it first began hitting the mainstream. In some psychedelic trance circles and online communities, ‘Psychedelic’ is the preferred name for the genre as it provides an umbrella term for the many divergent styles including Goa, full on, dark, prog and suomi. Referring to it as “psychedelic” also distinguishes the style from the ‘clubbier’ type of trance music and reinforces the roots of Goa trance in the psychedelic community. Psychedelic trance generally has a fast tempo, in the range 135 to 150 BPM but has developed into numerous different styles within the genre all with their own range of tempos. The emphasis in psychedelic trance is placed strongly on purely synthesized timbres in terms of programming and lead melodies. The original Goa trance was often made with popular Modular synthesizers and hardware samplers, but the preference in Psychedelic trance has moved to sample manipulation and storage in VST and AU software sampler applications. The use of analog synthesizers for sound synthesis has given way to digital “virtual analog” instruments like the Nord Lead, Access Virus, Korg MS-2000, Roland JP-8000 and computer VST and AU plugins like Native Instruments Reaktor. These are usually controlled by MIDI sequencers within Digital Audio Workstation (DAW) applications.

Psychedelic trance is most popular in the UK, Israel, Portugal, Mexico, Germany, Japan, Australia, Brazil, South Africa, Belgium, Serbia, Macedonia, Netherlands, the Nordic countries and India. The genre is not as well known outside its scene as uplifting or progressive is.

Psychedelic trance is often played at outdoor festivals. The festivals often take place over a few days with music being played through the night and well into the next day. These big events usually offer a lot parallel activities, not just music. The Psy Trance scene is very concerned about ecology and nature, and hence it’s very usual to find a lot of workshops with educational activities against racism, and promoting love and care for Our Mother Nature.

The big trance festivals often form a small independent city, where some 10,000 people from different places of the world meet to celebrate music and life. During winter many parties take place in clubs in modern suburbia or on the many beaches in foreign climes frequented by travelers.

Some people at these festivals frequently consume psychedelic drugs like LSD and psychedelic mushrooms. The smoking of Cannabis is widespread within the global Psy-trance scene. Drugs such as Ecstasy, cocaine and amphetamine are also used to some extent. There is also a large portion of the psytrance community – including many successful artists, dj’s, party organizers and party goers – who do not use drugs, or no longer use drugs.

Soon Psychedelic trance was expanding rapidly 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.