WTF Happened to Psytrance? From Psychedelic to Predictable

The Lounge
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I have to admit, I was a bit hesitant to upload this because I really don’t want to step on any toes. However, I feel like it’s time we talked about something that’s been on my mind and on the minds of many others. Has Psytrance lost its edge? Has it become a bit too formulaic? A lot of the tracks I come across these days seem to follow the same set of rules—using similar sounds and carrying the same general vibe. I made a video on this topic…

Many of my friends who are DJs and producers—very active in the Psytrance community—have shared similar concerns but often choose not to speak up to avoid any negative backlash.

Since I’m no longer reliant on the scene for my livelihood, I feel it’s important to bring this conversation forward.

In this video, I revisit some tracks from some of the most innovative Psytrance artists from the early days, before 2000, and explore how we’ve moved from a musically diverse scene to one that today sounds remarkably consistent.

While this is all highly subjective and there are certainly exceptions, I think we need to discuss the current state of Psy-trance. Please leave your comments, let’s dive into this together!

See how general interest has declined: https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&q=psytrance,psy%20trance,psy-trance&hl=en-GB

Playlist used in the video: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL5CLbdUhSXcRPhV6hSSh-rSNrKlhDevIi&si=02BGf29Knu95wsE5

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I will watch the video a bit later but I’ve been psytrance fan since late 90s and already have a strong opinion on what happened to psytrance

yes

most definitely.

because it works.

WTF happened to psytrance?

festivals happened. from small parties for tens/couple hundreds people festivals started pulling people by the thousands. they started making money. to not lose money and make more money they provide what works and not so much of the experimental, different things.
worst thing for festival is seeing empty dance floor which happened a lot because so many people come to see Astrix/Loud/ and can’t deal with something else.

so they started removing these artists, bringing all stars, dividing the schedule prog by day - darker, faster music by smaller and smaller portion of the night, driving real fans out and bringing more people who don’t care they just want to hear the same formulaic banging music.

nowadays expectations are set, labels don’t sign experimental things, they don’t get to play at festivals unless it “suits the sound”, so yeah, that’s what happened.

I was talking a lot about Zenon, they were innovation, the variety in the music was nuts, from Florian MSK deep texture techno music to Millivot dark prog to Sourone glitch, then they started to sign artists that sound exactly the same with that “Zenon” sound, because label gotta do what label gotta do to spot bookings, sell music, right?

don’t judge them, but I find it unfortunate that they stopped signing innovative artists and stick to the formula. so are many other labels in many genres, even in forest genre.

hitech is still innovating a bit but not everything, most of them just adding bpm while only handful really doing new still like Psykovsky.
other genres just follow the lead of the expectations.

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The best psytrance I heard was always at illegal parties. Or they had better drugs who knows. :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

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It never had one.

Er, it was from the start. Only got worse.

Probably the least psychedelic form of music you can find. Nothing psychedelic about it at all.

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you can say that about psychedelic rock too, nothing psychedelic for me in it at all, but it’s still a genre.
the definition of psychedelic rock:

Psychedelic rock is a rock music genre that is inspired, influenced, or representative of psychedelic culture, which is centered on perception-altering hallucinogenic drugs. The music incorporated new electronic sound effects and recording techniques, extended instrumental solos, and improvisation.

that’s what psytrance was at the beginning, from goa to other places these underground parties were all about drugs and artists playing live and improvising a lot, very little of them survived but some still banging, Eat Static (Merv), Juno Reactor, handful still playing improvs, some reverted to DJ mixes like Parasense (can’t blame him really, the other half died some time ago and he can’t or don’t want to pull live music alone).

some old goa artists still play live at ZNA Gathering like Xenomorph, KoxBox, Digital Talk, but many just playing sets.

if you try listening to psytrance at home you’d probably won’t like it, but take a stroll through a real underground party and you’ll fall in love, the vibe is insane, nothing like it really.
I spent many teenage years tripping in forest parties and they were the best parties I’ve ever been to, the vibes are unreal.

today things are different, money is talking, you can feel it in every inch of every major event, people expecting big names, people expect organization, people expect the expected, and the organizers need to deliver.

when I went to Boom Festival in 2012 they had a stage called Alchemy Circle, it’s still there but at the time 80% of music there was a totally new thing I’ve never heard before, last time I was there in 2022 maaaaybe one set was unfamiliar, everything else were dominating bookings from known labels, same thing over and over again.

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I’ve been to plenty. Always preferred the techno.
Played at plenty small doofs, small DIY gigs, and massive festivals. Never seen the appeal. It all sounds the same. Plastic baselines with zap kicks.

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well, I was the other way around, never liked techno until recent years, never connected with it because mostly it was clubs - which I hated, I loved the open air parties, but around early 2000 music started being boring as fuck so I stopped going until ~2010.
new things emerged like hitech, dark prog, fast forest stuff, really liked it, but it’s been the same thing until now…

yeah I guess I feel the same way about most techno too, same 303/808/909 sounds :slight_smile:

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When I saw John 00 Fleming on ‘a place in the sun’ (uk tv program about buying a holiday home) I definitely knew psytrance had lost its edge

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Same for any scene tho innit.

Starts off all DIY and underground and earnest as fuck, then it gets noticed by the trustafarians/hipsters/future bank managers and they set about sucking the life out of it, like they do everything else.

They come for all of us in the end.

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let’s hope they don’t come for noise scene :slight_smile:
vultures

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They kinda did in the US. Noise over there is full of boring hipster twats and their little DOD pedals pissing themselves about how their mummy and daddy cut them off.

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Anything that is organised now is yuppy. Theres no escaping it. Im from the 60’s and 70s and it was disorganised chaos at festivals. Great times. We didnt want being told what to do or say.

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Nice choice of tracks from back in the day on your video… and it’s a reasonable assessment of semi long term state of a music scene which gets used as a punching bag by fans of most other electronic genres, though is there anything newly original and purely uncliche’d nowadays? Still load of people at festivals though, so someone going to their first event now may well be writing the same post in 2044 about how good the tunes were back in '24.

It would be good to see anyone post clips (if it’s at all possible) of modern tracks which have something original to say. I have been out of the psy loop for over 15 years so can’t really comment, but I did randomly see a Tsuyoshi set last year dead straight at a small venue which unexpectedly had fresh sounds with breathing space, creative basslines and stories that travelled, so I can only assume that good original psy music is still being made somewhere by someone.

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if you’re looking for goa, check out Skizologic and Zion 604 label, guys are pretty awesome, bringing old school goa vibes with modern touch, they play a lot with Tsuyoshi nowadays

if you’re into darker stuff there’s Irgum Burgum doing amazing stuff

if you’re into hitech there’s Psykovsky, there are many others but he’s real good

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I would imagine that any genre, once it becomes recognized as such, stagnates.

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Also… there’s only so much variation you can add to a formula before the track starts to sound like a different genre. The more niche your genre, the more this holds true. Add in the fact that over time more people controbute to the body of recordings in a genre, and you’re bound to have a degree of same-ness.

Early adopters get the fun of exploring the edges of a genre. Late-comers get the cash.

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There is also a case of overproduction. Watching tutorials how everything needs to be perfectly in tune, having that “perfect” kick, preferring polished sound and precision sequencing over originality and improvisation, so everybody is using same tools and techniques.

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absolutely, but this is because no one will sign you unless your sound is “tight”, no one does psytrance open mic nights, it’s either you’re playing parties or you just uploading to soundcloud, no in between, small parties almost non-existant anymore so it’s either you’re doing it “the right way” (whatever is expected) and play your stuff at parties or you don’t do it…

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This is just what happens with “genres”. Any and all of them

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Thanks everyone for your feedback on this, a lot of really valid points here… Really liked that The Square - DNA track. The new super fast stuff is just over my head :smile: