Saturday, August 26, 2006
The History of Psychedelic trance from From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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, melodic, dark, progressive 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 Greece, UK, Israel, Portugal, Mexico, Germany, Japan, Australia, Brazil, South Africa, Belgium, Serbia, FYROM, Netherlands, the Nordic countries and India. The genre is not as well known outside its scene as uplifting or progressive is.
Contents
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1 Psychedelic trance vs Goa trance
2 History
2.1 Development in Israel
3 Commercial success
4 Psychedelic trance scene
5 Psychedelic trance artists and projects
6 See also
7 External links
7.1 General information
7.2 History
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Psychedelic trance vs Goa trance
The term "psychedelic trance" is used almost synonymously with "Goa trance". Goa trance is a precursor to the late 1990s psychedelic trance, which utilizes more sophisticated melodic devices and distinctive basslines. Goa trance is an almost completely defunct genre of music, based on the fact that few if any contemporary artists would describe the music they create as being of this genre, with the notable exception of Swedish producer Filteria, whose music deliberately uses the same hardware and compositional techniques that defined the Goa sound. The term "Psychedelic trance" is used to distinguish the newer material made by many artists, who were formerly known to have produced Goa trance. Full on is a sub-genre characterized by "solidly driven" basslines, melodies, and frequent use of DSP Effects. Notable artists include, Spain's (Ibiza) Growling Mad Scientists G.M.S. and Israel's Astrix in comparison to the more "clubbier" minimalist and less melodic genres, such as progressive trance with more of a psychedelic influence, exemplified by many Scandinavian and German artists, including Sweden's Son Kite. Many use the term Goa trance to simply distinguish those pieces which seem to incorporate eastern, Indian, or "organic" melodies (see raga), derived from sources, like Indian classical music. This makes it easier to identify those which don't incorporate such elements, which listeners would call Psychedelic trance. These pieces tend to be more experimental and futuristic (in the case of Full on), usually using programmed melodies juxtapositionally derived from minor arpeggios Cm7, Dm7, Em7, etc and other exotic or unusual harmonic combinations (see transposition), with the intent of being multi-timbral (see glissando). Both genres, however, continue to use samples taken from sources, like sci-fi films, documentaries, etc.
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History
Raja Ram has been experimenting with psychedelic trance as early as the 1980s. He has been part of numerous projects including the well-known ambient group Shpongle, The Infinity Project and 1200 Micrograms. He is also the owner of the TIP World record label.
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.
Image:Project II Trance.jpg
Project II Trance, the first Psychedelic Trance compilation.
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, Republic of Macedonia, The Netherlands, Switzerland, Austria, Greece, Russia, Hungary, Portugal, Finland, Russia, Ukraine, Thailand, Denmark, Poland, Canada and even the United States.
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Development in Israel
In 1988 changes in the law and political situation of Israel, allowed many Israelis to acquire Indian travel visas for the first time, many having just completed military service and wanting a complete change of environment. The beaches of Goa were a natural destination. Many Israelis returned from their trips bringing with them recordings of this new style of music. Developing in almost complete isolation from the scenes elsewhere, Israeli DJs emerged playing their own variations on the sound. These included individuals such as Avi Nissim and Lior Perlmutter (SFX and later Astral Projection), Har-El Prussky and Miko (California Sunshine), Guy Sebbag, Avi Algranati (Phreaky, Space Cat) and Ofer Dikovsky (Oforia). Naturally, Israeli labels formed, including Melodia Records, Trust In Trance Records, Phonokol and Krembo Records. With the emergence of new innovative artists such as Infected Mushroom, psychedelic trance firmly established itself in the alternative culture in Israel, more so than in any other country in the world.
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Commercial success
In recent years, sales of psychedelic trance have been falling. The decline was : -2,8% in 2001, and -8,8% in 2002. A typical album usually sells around 2,000 copies, and selling more than 5,000 copies would be considered a success. There are only a handful of artists who sold more than 20,000 copies, including Hallucinogen, G.M.S., Infected Mushroom, Transwave, and Astral Projection. Hallucinogen's Twisted has had the most commercial success to date, selling around 85,000 copies.
The reasons for this decline in public interest include overproduction, copyright infringement, and lack of publicity. In fact, the market has not grown much, however the number of new labels and artists has increased exponentially. Much of psychedelic trance is also channeled through illegal copying by sharing of music, particularly among students and streaming audio on the internet. Although this has opened up the market to newcomers, most of these fans do not have the ability to purchase music since it is not normally distributed in mainstream record stores (mostly internet shops).
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Psychedelic trance scene
Simon Posford performing at the Soulclipse Festival
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 of 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 travellers.
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. Many of these people believe experiencing the music in the intended spirit of the festivals is the high in and of itself.
While psychedelic trance music has lost its popularity in the 2000s, it is immensely popular and the dominant dance-genre in South Africa,GOA, Israel and Brazil. It is also still particularly popular in Portugal, Greece, Serbia, Albania, Pakistan, India, Holland, Mexico, Russia, Germany, and Australia.
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Psychedelic trance artists and projects
Psychedelic trance is often produced in a collaboration between two or more artists, called a "project". Somewhat different from other genres of music is the fact that one artist could be part of as many as ten or more projects, often simultaneously. Each different combination of artists almost always has a unique name. For example X-Dream (Jan Muller and Marcus Maichel) and Planet B.E.N. (Ben Wierzoch) are two well known projects from Germany. The collaboration between Jan and Ben is called Organic Noise and the collaboration between Marcus and Ben is called Fools and Tools. This partly accounts for the large number of psychedelic trance projects.
As shown above the names of projects made up of the same artists can often be unrelated, although this is not always the case. For example, many projects involving Infected Mushroom are often prefixed with the word "Infected" or postfixed with the word "Mushroom" (Examples: Domestic Mushroom, Infected Astrix).
Making things even more confusing is the fact that the same exact artist(s) or group(s) of artists will sometimes produce music under different project names to showcase different variations of their music. Quasar also known as "Pulsar"(Dance oriented variations) as well as "Trancention" (Lighter trance music),but are really the same artists Quasar and Pulsar VanderHousen.
Very few psychedelic trance artists release albums under their own name (Tim Schuldt & Shanti Matkin are two exceptions). Instead, the name of the project is sometimes chosen to describe the theme of the music being produced. Not surprisingly, Crop Circles and Pleiadians releases are focused on the topic of space travel.
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Astral Projection Interview for psyreviews AMEN interview
Your new album is called 'Amen' and begins with a prayer for universal peace, have you got any strong spiritual/religious beliefs yourselves?
Avi : We don't practice any religioun apart from music, which connects us to the world. Amen - Just that people will live with love, brotherhood of man, no racism, and you don't need to be religious to have those values. We were educated this way and we hope that through our music we can encourage the change that every person in the world wishes for - Universal Peace. It might sound banal, but this is the real source for happiness.
Do you believe that we (mankind) will ever live in a state of 'universal peace'? Do you think it could happen in our lifetime?
Avi : I realize I'll sound banal again, especially in the worse period we have seen in such a long time. We're on the verge of war against Iraq & we can't tell where this war will end.
I know that most people don't think that universal peace is possible at all, but I do think differently & I say to those who revoke that pure Peace, Brotherhood & Love, can exist when people will learn to change their attitude, & it's a matter of openness & understanding, & of course - How much a person who's flooded with hatred is ready to change his ways. I believe that with the right attitude & with the right understanding, even nations that lived in hatred for years upon years can get along. It's a matter of time & I think it will take another few millenniums before things will change on our poor planet. I can't believe that there are people who choose war. The majority wants to live in peace, as comfortable they can. Those who wants it different & searching for war, will sentence themselves as Sadam Hussein does. This war might benefit all human race in order to clean the dirt & destroy the virus in order to create a real peace between all the nations.
All the Trance music values are based, consciously or un- consciously, on Freedom, peace, love, one nation, one language, same symbols. We might have not paid enough attention, but we are in the midst of the greatest revolution in the history, for all of the Trance Tribe. It's a long process but I believe that through the artists & the huge crowd the change I speak about here will come.
John Lennon wrote "Imagine". He dreamt it all. We are here to make it come true. Imagine al the people living life without boundaries, with no racism - What a happy life we could have.
Back to the album, how are your tracks conceived (from inspiration to their production)?
Avi : Tracks are made by hard work. There's no such thing as wham bam thank you mam, and here we have a track. We start with the sound programming, & a lot of time sitting in front of the computer. Starting from a certain base line, adding many layers. Sometimes a certain role that is created inspires the next role and the evolving of the track. First of all we create some raw material that is on the computer way before the editing. Even in the editing stage we keep changing things, adding or changing roles according to changes created while editing, every role waits for the right time and the right entrance, and every role gets the respect it deserves, that's why our tracks are long. When we enter the studio to work on an album, there is no chance we will release something that we don't love or are not content with. Every time we enter the studio to work on an album, we are very excited and without this excitement there is no point for the whole thing. The mix stage, which is the final and last one, closes the process of making the track. This process usually takes us about a month. But for us a track is perfect only after we have checked it in a club and we saw the audience respond, the audience is for us an active partner in all we have released so far.
We write, arrange, and do sound programming all together. There's no single formula for the duo to put a track together though. We start a track off with a sampler, a melody line, a groove, a TB 303 sequence. Then we quickly start work on the bass and drums and build it up from there. The sounds and the mixing are worked on as we compose. It can take us from two weeks to a month to finish a track because we have the luxury of owning two professional recording studios.
Inspirations: Anything goes ... movies, life, good music, our families ,My little daughter-things that inspired us on each album.We inspire each other and always feel that we complete one another like a puzzle. We both have studios at home, and we both have a lot of experience and we've been around for a long time. We almost always agree on things, and if there is a problem with a certain role, we immediately change it and it doesn't matter who made it. We don't have ego problems with everything that has to do with our music making, it is clear to both of us that we share the same goal, making the best music.
Who/what musically influences you?
Avi : We are open to various musical styles as long as it's got a point to it - emotions, story and concept. It's got to be rich, varied, with a high production range and vast sounds; it shouldn't be an anaemic production. It's not always like this but sometimes you can find new interesting talents, even in the most monotonous genres.
Some of your earlier material, such as the tracks recorded as SFX, was quite dark, then it seemed with the 'Trust in Trance' album your music became very uplifting with a big production sound, was this a conscious change or a natural progression?
Avi :`It was a natural progression , we love dark music , and we love melodic music. The concept of Astral Projection from the beginning, since the days of SFX in 1988, was first of all music, regardless of fashions coming and going. All along the way we're trying to preserve the concept of very high standards of Production, musical ideas, reach imagination, and very pedantic control without compromise. We spend many hours in the studio, about 14 hours a day, and work on an album 1 year to 2 year's. We don't allow ourselves to release a product that we are not satisfied with. If you browse through our computer, you'll find enough material to make more than 200 hundred albums that might make others content, but they were'nt good enough for us. You can play, for example, a track we made in 1994, and you'll see people are still enjoying themselves and dance to it madly, like it was made in 2003. And this is actually the main idea, regardless of time and fashion,
keeping the quality without compromising.
Of course, with the passing of time, experience and knowledge accumulated from album to album, we added more equipment, in order to be able to make without borders and obstacles, whatever is on our minds, no encountering technical limitations.
Astral Projection are one of the few (only) psychedelic trance acts whose tunes have crossed over into the more commercial trance DJ sets and mainstream clubs (sometimes even heard on the radio!), here in England. Do you have any success in Israel outside of the psy trance scene?
Avi : Of course! We usually are invited to perform in every commercial event or party, for instance in Eilat together with DJ Tiesto or when Faithless arrived to Israel or along side Paul Oakenfold & John 00 Fleming. The Israeli crowd has a very high standard & very pedantic when it comes to quality, especially when it comes to music. The top commercial productions in Israel with top D.J's, will always be reinforced by Israeli Psy groups. We have here some of the best groups in the world such as: Infected Mushrooms, Yahel, Alien Project, Space Cat, Uforia, MFG, Astrix, Atomic Pulse, Dynamic, Dark Soho, Analog Pussy, Domestic & so many groups that about to break through
What do you think of the darker more twisted side of Israeli trance, bands like: Infected Mushroom, Dark Soho etc?
Avi : We are close friend of Infected & Dark Soho, & I think there's a place for all styles. Its a great thing to have a variety of musical styles. Preferably as many styles as possible! At the end of the day we are here for our audience, & when there's a choice its means there's culture, interest & there's power!
As for myself, I love strong music as well as melodic material, the only condition is that the music must sound good, be well produced, interesting musically & most important - it must make me feel excited & make me shiver all over!! There's musical material I love of those groups & some I like less. Playing a DJ set, I have noticed that most of my set is built with Israeli musician material. Probably there's something in here, some magic under the surface that makes the Israeli Trance musicians create such quality music, appreciated world-wide. Remember our country is a small country, just a dot on the globe, but we make such a noise all over the world - absolutely unbelievable!
How is the party scene in Israel today? Is the Israeli government still being hard on the scene?
Avi : The situation in Israel today can't be understood by those who don't live here. Everyday there is fear of the suicide bombers and it can be anywhere, on buses, kindergartens and these terrorists can harm innocent kids. Imagine yourself sitting in a restaurant, laughing with your wife, your friends and kids and all of a sudden everything is cut off by crazy killer. I feel it strongly when I'm driving with my 3 year old daughter; I look around for suspicious people all the time. With all the terror around we try to maintain our normal life, entering the studio to try and try to run away from the crazy routine. That kind of pressure is just a part of our life - whether we want it or not. We are lucky to have music to help us release this tension. We are very upset when we are invited to perform somewhere overseas and we turn on the radio in the hotel and hear the local news. Mostly the media is Pro-Palestinian, and it doesn't give the balanced picture.
In spite of all this, we love our country, even though we could live anywhere with our profession. But here, there is that magic that connects us. I don't see ourselves leaving soon. People don't have the mood due to the terror & current political situation. The situation, in which police trash the parties, arrests the musicians & Party-goers. This is an un-acceptable situation. People had enough from the police trashing the party, they had it with the drug dealers, the criminals who come to spoil the parties. People prefer to go to the big raves, to the Club-Trance where the police do not show up from some reason.
In Israel people loves Tiesto very much, all the Club Trance elite. At the moment people do not go out so much due to the political situation, no one wants to explode from a suicide-terrorist in the middle of a party. That's why "Astral" are performing now mainly outside of Israel. We prefer to play in a party, in which we can be sure that will not be closed, without the absurd situations of police chases.
Where in the world do you most enjoy playing? Is there anywhere in the world that you've not played that you'd like to?
Avi : We played in so many places in the world - you can check our website... We plan to perform soon on Mars ;-)
We haven't been yet to South Africa or Brazil, but this year we shall get there.
How does playing live compare to DJing?
Avi : I love both Playing live as well as DJing. When we play live we play only Astral Projection Music. We have enough music to last 15 parties!! We receive feedback from the crowd at the pick of the show & when we & the crowd go wild, it's the strongest & the most exiting thing that artist can experience.
Working in the studio, you don't have that immediate feedback when you finish a track. We make sure to play new tracks on every performance. When we get that feedback from the crowd we start the process of taking the decision if that track will enter the album or not. We have the most direct catalyser that can be to an artist. Due to the intensive tours we do all over the world.
I enjoy very very very much to play as a DJ - It's something I'll never give up. I love many other groups in Trance & I'm proud & enjoy playing music, as well as other artist's music, or even just a sequence of another artist which I connect to. The reaction of the crowd is the most significant thing for me. When there is no interaction between the DJ & the crowd - the party
is a failure.
I have noticed that the D.J's learn by now to read their crowd, & they understand what the crowd wants, & I do appreciate it. DJing wise, which do you, prefer DAT or vinyl?
Avi : I prefer Vinyl. There's nothing like the sound of a record. Along the years I find myself playing CD's a lot. & it's wonderful - you can finish a track in the studio, burn it down in a second & mix it.
And blended or beat mixed?
Avi : Good question! - depends to which event. If it's DJ set - It has to be mixed. If it's a performance, it's nice to be able to play the track's beginning from time to time. We made it this way & we have to refer to the opening which has no beat - & not to rush immediately to the Base Drum. It's good when there's an introduction & build up to the opening of a track. This is what washes the listener into it!
Have you ever astrally projected or had an out of body experience?
Avi : We haven't experienced the Phenomena on its natural way, but I can tell you that every time I'm in the studio & a musical part or a mass of musical parts are being played together, I feel a little Astral Projection. It can happen in a show, where the interaction with the crowd is perfect & the atmosphere is at its best, there where I feel that my soul is getting out of my body & partying on between the invisible notes in the air.
And finally, do you still 'Trust in Trance'?
Avi : You are kidding me or what? The Trust in Trance is absolutely total for us & it is an un-separated part of our lives!
I'm proud to be a part of the revolution called Trance. You got to love it in order to be part of it, There is no other way!
Trust in Trance !
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Astral Projection talks to i:Vibes about their work 2002
Astral Projection is soon to release their new album Amen (October 22nd). In that context we got in touch with Avi Nissim, half of Astral Projection, and fired
a bunch of questions at him about their upcoming album, earlier work, greatest experiences and lots more. This also marks the start of a new era at i:Vibes, the coverage of Goa and Psycedelic trance!
Being one of the oldest bands in the scene Astral Projection have made a great impact on many of todays dj's and producers. They are the frontiers when it comes to their style of music and especially fellow Israelian artists have followed their footsteps with great success!
Big thanks from i:Vibes to Avi for answering all of our questions in such a thorough way!
Here we go...
i:Vibes: Could you tell us a bit about yourself? Hobbies or interests, pets, girlfriends, job maybe?
Avi: I`m 34 years old ( married + 1 daughter ), Lior is 31 years old ( married + dog ).
Our hobbies: movies, photographic, video, computers, animations, painting, sport ,internet ,jewels.
i:Vibes: How did your musical career start? How did the two of you come together? Have you always been fans of dance music?
Avi: Lior & me first got into dance music around 1988 when acid house got started in U.K. We`d already been making music for a few years, but our biggest influence around then was the first acid tracks compilation. Until that, we were both into heavier post-industrial electronic music-anything from Neon judgement to Spk, from Kraftwerk to psychic tv to skinny puppy.
When we started making music around 1983 we had a Yamaha dx7 and dx9, a Roland juno 106 , a kawai R 100 drum machine and an old commodore 64 computer running dr t`s kcs software. Somewhere by 1988 we started making dance music together as SFX. In 1994 we became Astral Projection.
i:Vibes: Most have the opinion that your music is something inbetween goa and psytrance! And most dance artists in Israel produce psychedelic trance! What do you think distincts your music from the rest of the Israelian producers?
Avi: The concept of Astral Projection from the beginning, since the days of SFX in 1988, was first of all music, regardless of fashions coming and going.
All along the way we're trying to preserve the concept of very high standards. Production, musical ideas, reach imagination, and very pedantic control without compromise. We spend many hours in the studio, about 14 hours a day, and work on an album about 9 months (just like pregnancy).
We don't allow ourselves to release a product that we are no satisfied with. If you browse through our computer, you'll find enough material to more than 200 albums, that might have make others content, but that were not good enough for us. You can play, for example, a track we made in 1994, and you'll see people are still enjoying themselves and dance to it madly, like it was made today, in the year 2002. And this is actually the main idea, regardless of time and fashion, keeping the quality without compromising.
Of course, with the passing of time, experience and knowledge accumulated from album to album, we added more equipment, in order to be able to make without borders and obstacles, whatever is on our minds, no encountering technical limitations.
i:Vibes: You guys have been producing for a long time, and are well known to alot of people, but how did you start producing? What got you into producing trance?
Avi: Actually, when we started producing trance, back in '88, we were dealing with electronic music. We basically created a new line that didn't really exist around the world. The name 'trance' arrived after many changes.
Names like 'acid house', 'techno', 'new beat', always paralleled our musical creation patterns. In 1993 it was 'trance' and there it stayed. So you can say we understood that we make trance, when this scene was actually born.
What got us into producing trance was the unlimited freedom a musician can reach through working in a midi studio with electronic equipment. You program a sound from zero, and the sky is the limit. The possibilities are huge, opposing standard instruments, which basically stay with the same sound character.
Another thing was the possibilities in instrumental music, which speaks for itself, without a leading singer.
i:Vibes: You have been very quiet for a long time within the trance scene, but now your new album is getting released on Phonokol the 21st of October, any news on the production? What style will the album be in, will it maybe sound like your older work?
Avi: We are releasing the album on our own label Trust in Trance. Phonokol are our partners for many years.
We were working on our artist's album AMEN for almost two years and we had plenty of materials. We wanted it to be perfect album from all aspects, as well as maintain our integrity.
During these two years, we tested the new tracks at parties for our crowd. The tracks which received positive energies from the crowd, we marked as the tracks which work for us. It took us time, but we are so lucky that no one measured our studio hours with a stopwwatch. We recorded the entire album in our two studios. A good and interesting album must contain new ideas, new sequences and new sounds. The easiest would be to re-cycle ourselves, but we didn't want that. We kept the Astral's concept with our typical sounds, but with new elements in the audio work.
i:Vibes: What are your musical influences? Is it from older dance music acts or dance acts at all?
Avi: Our musical influenced come from anything that sound good, unique ideas, it`s not necessary have to be trance, anything goes ... from Kraftwerk to Madonna.
i:Vibes: Do you have a busy schedule at the moment? We at i:Vibes wonder if you will ever come to Scandinavia or the UK again to perform?
Avi: These days we don't have time to breathe ... we are working so hard, every weekend we are finding ourselves in different places all over the world ... we are coming to Scandinavia during march 2003, UK shows will start from we are planning to do a launce party for Amen across 4 continents April June 2003.
U can get updated through our web site: www.astral-projection.com go to live shows section.
i:Vibes: You are now done with the Amen album, what other projects do you work on now?
Avi: We plan a new album release August 2003. all ready in a deep process!
There are so many plans and some are still confidential but here's some:
There's a plan for a long tour in the U.S.A for the beginning of july 2003 - San Francisco - L.A - NY.
We plan to peform in Goa this year and a short trip to Brazil.
We plan a remix album of all our classics tracks, performed by top Trance musicians that you all know well. No dates yet, still at work proccess.
Around April we plan a release of a new Israeli Psychedely Trance Vol. 6, and yes ... DVD including tv-interviews,live shows, studio work, making of, video clips for our classics tracks ... no date yet.
i:Vibes: Which new Israelian artist do you think have the most potential to come a long way within music? And who do you think is the best producer in the scene at the moment?
Avi: Israeli trance rules! & Big Time! & Full Power!
We look at the new generation artists like: Alien Project, Astrix, Atomic
Pulse, Dynamic, Sesto Sento, they are all braking everywhere & we are very
happy to see the scene grows & we are glad to inspire so many talented
artists & opened the door for Israeli Trance music to be so recognized &
well admired around the world.
The best producer at the moment is Avi Algranati from Space Cat.
i:Vibes: How is the clubscene in Israel these days? Do you prefer to do your performances in your home country? Or do you have your greatest fans and largest orients elsewere?
Avi: In Israel the Trance did caught "Big time". We have got the best musicians, we have the best audience in the world, an audience that knows what he wants, audience that knows what he is going to get when he comes to a party. The un-bearable political situation, the everyday terrorists attacks, people are in constant tension, they don't know where & when & what will happen the next day, who shall live, & all of that means - Pressure!
Where would you go to release all of that - if not to a M.F Trance party - to forget all the bullshit, & believe me, here, in Israel, we know how to unwind & explode.
I do not believe that there is a situation like that on any other place in the world! I'm in tour with Astral Projection since '94, we have been to many places, & Experienced quite a bit. We always say that for us there are no differences between the countries we are playing at. People everywhere are reacting in the same sympathy & frenzied to our music. I love it - a 0-nation party, One family.
Today, from some reason the Club Trance appeals to many people. It's not that the people don't want Intelligence Trance anymore.
People don't have the mood due to the terror & current political situation. The situation, in which police trash the parties, arrests the musicians & Party-goers.
This is an un-acceptable situation. People had enough from the police trashing the party, they had it with the drug dealers, the criminals who come to spoil the parties. People prefer to go to the big raves, to the Club-Trance where the police do not show up from some reason.
In Israel people loves Tiesto very much, all the Club Trance elite. At the moment people do not go out so much due to the political situation, no one wants to explode from a suicide-terrorist in the middle of a party. That's why "Astral" are performing now mainly outside of Israel. We prefer to play in a party, in which we can be sure that will not be closed, without the absurd situations of police chases.
i:Vibes: When and where did you have your best experience performing live? How did that affect your work?
Avi: It's a tough question. Each party has its own magic - the place, the view, the people, & there were plenty of parties. I think Goa '99 was one of the best in our career. We played most of our music from many years for many hours. The crowed knew all the tracks. It was in Anjuna's Flee market.
It was a party that was organized in a few hours. People kept asking us when the party is, & we were there just for a holiday! We didn't plan anything. We realized that something has to be done & we got it together with a place, sound system & Baksheesh. In few hours we were surrounded by 2,000 people who came out of knowhere! I like this kind of parties. I remember another one in Fuji Mt. in Japan, a party under an active volcano. It was a party inside a cloud. Beautiful scenery & great crowd!
i:Vibes: Whats your current favourite track? And favourite track of all time?
Avi: Current favourite track: Astral Projection - Chaos (from the Amen album).
Favourite track of all time: M.W.N.N. - Teleport.
i:Vibes: Most people are familiar with tracks of yours like 'Mahadeva' and 'People can fly', which one of your tracks do you think is your best track ever produced? And Why?
Avi: They were all our sons. (ha, ha, ha)! If you insist. Let There Be Light, People Can Fly, Dancing Galaxy, Life on Mars, Chaos, Nexuses, Aurora b ... ( I cant stop ;-) Liquid sun, Mahadeva, Power Gen... Track is made by hard work. There's no such thing as wham bam thank you mam, and here we have a track. It's a hard work. Starting with the sound programming, sitting a lot of in front of the computer.
i:Vibes:How has your writing changed over the years, is there a particular way you write a track? Why do you think you've always produced that incredible up-lifting anthemic sound?
Avi: Starting from a certain base line that's on, adding many layers of different roles that all along the creation keep on changing. Sometimes a certain role that is created inspires the next role and the evolving of the track.
First of all we create some raw material that is on the computer way before the editing. Even in the editing stage we keep changing things, adding or changing roles according to changes created while editing, every role waits for the right time and the right entrance, and every role gets the respect it deserves, that's why our tracks are long.
When we enter the studio to work on an album, there is no chance we will release something that we don't love or aren't not content with. Every time we enter the studio to work on an album we are very excited and without this excitement there is no point for the whole thing. The mix stage, which is the final and last one, closes the process of making the track. This process usually takes us about a month. But for us a track is perfect only after we checked it in a party and we saw the audience respond, the audience is for us an active partner in all we have released so far.
We write, arrange, and do sound programming all together. There's no single formula for the duo to put a track together though. We start a track off with a sampler, a melody line, a groove, a TB 303 sequence. Then we quickly start work on the bass and drums and build it up from there. The sounds and the mixing are worked on as we compose. It can take us from two weeks to a month to finish a track because we have the luxury of owning two professional recording studios.
i:Vibes: Who came up with the idea to your classic music-video 'People can fly'? Did it take long to produce, and was it costly (considering the computer-generated 3d-graphics were a lot harder to create those days)? Do you feel your international break-through came through MTV and other music-tv-channels?
Avi: 'People can fly' & 'Dancing galaxy' videos were made with our team, friends, the best Israeli animators. We have the best people in Israel ... this days we are working on Amen video.
This track is about the current stage of the world, a state of a war, we are on the verge of a third world war. This is a prayer for universal peace and a wish for Utopia, that we wish was possible. It expresses a wish for a world peace. soon u will be able to see it on MTV!
Regarding your qoustion about the international break through ... it's still so hard to push trance into main stream ... u wont be able to see our videos running with Madonna ... u could find them only on a special programs like 'party zone' ... but I believe that in time this will change ... most of the world is already prepared for this trance revolution!
i:Vibes: Is there any producer you would like to collaborate with? If so how do you think that will end up?
Avi: We have been collaborate with: Dado from Trance wave, Triliton & MFG.
From time to time we are doing remixes: we did 'God is a DJ' for Faithless ... 'Aqua line spirit' for Electric Universe ... 'Trance dance' for Triliton.
These days we`ve just finessed for Domestic 'Pure nrg' ( it`s going to be release in Transient records in a few weeks ), but ...mostly we prefer to work together ( Lior & me ).
i:Vibes: Do you have any disguises? Do you produce under any other names than just Astral Projection?
Avi: Yes we have, but it`s a big secret ... ;-) .
i:Vibes: Finally, is there anything you would like to say to your fans and i:Vibes visitors?
Avi:I would you like to say to our many fans:
We were nothing with out your love & without your support.
At our web site - www.astral-projection.com - we receive hundreds of e-mails from fans who expresses their love & this is the most exiting thing in the world for us!
Thanks alot for listening:
Avi Nissim
Astral Projection
www.astral-projection.com
1:52 AM - 2 Comments - 4 Kudos - Add Comment
A view back on 2003 quuestions by i:vibes
Avi from Astral Projection
1. How has 2003 been for you?
Unbelievable year, one of the best good nrg`s / killer parties all over the plant ...
in the personal life: we have got divorced - girls we are free now :-) yes !
2. Best moment of 2003? Worst?
Best moment in Mexico & full moon festival Germany.
Worst (very sad moment) Cosma dead in Goa 10/2/03. He was one of the best people I've ever met!!! A real friend!!! And a very intelligent musician ... sad !
3. If you could pick out one song that represents 2003 which would it be and why?
Astrix - Scientific Reality... This track opened a new line of full-on psychedlic goa trance.
And this is for me the best combination - 145 bpm / killer party / good vibes / I`ve found all of this in this track. There are so many tracks, but u ask me to pick only 1 :-( I love plenty of trance bands & I love to play them as a DJ & to get inspiration into our music! It's good to be open !
4. What did amaze you the most this year?
wow ... let me think ... :-) Hard question man ... wow ... Everyday for me it's an amazing day ... it doesn't necessary have to be gigantic things ... to see the Sun everyday, and to see my Baby -Amit - smiling & happy to see her grow up ( she is almost 5 years old ) this is for me the amazing thing !
5. Anything else you want to tell us?
Trust in trance ;-)
6. How did you spend your new year's eve?
In Yugoslavia Belgrade ... amazing unbelievable party ... full on / killer / wOw !
12:42 AM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment
Astral Projection July 2000. interview
By: Mattias Huss
Photo by: Håkan Bruce for Release
Astral Projection live at the Arvika Festival in July 2000.
Rising up from the ashes of the stale psychedelic trance scene, like a loved up phoenix, Astral Projection have left the days of white labels and goa compilations. Israeli superstars Lior Perlmutter and Avi Nissim moved to the country-side to keep their music pure.
Einstürzende Neubauten wannebees?
Everything is connected. Astral Projection would like that sort of comment, with their love for spirituality and spacey imagery. But it's true. The thin threads connecting everything can be seen all around us. Like here, at the Arvika Festival, with the world's biggest trance act appearing on the same stage as Einstürzende Neubauten and Laibach.
- These guys were our idols when we were like sixteen, says Lior Perlmutter. We heard their music and said "Wow! This is the stuff we want to do". I don't think we ever dreamed that we would be playing on the same stage as Einstürzende Neubauten.
A healthy diet of body music
Let's follow this thread back into the eighties, to Israel where a couple of guys grown up on a healthy diet of body music and industrial start out making heavy electronics. Lior again:
- Avi got these tapes from England in 1988, you know, the acid house era. He started playing them as a DJ at clubs in Israel and those were the best parties ever.
- Thanks, says Avi.
, Avi provides the drama. ,he is the entertainer up there, pointing his finger into the air and doing his "I'm gonna push this button and you're gonna dance"-gesture.
Of course, Lior and Avi got together to make some serious music. They started a couple of labels and recorded under a number of names, the most famous of which was SFX.
Hitting in Goa
On the "Trust in Trance" compilation, most of the tracks were made by what would become Astral Projection. Soon things got big. Still, Lior says they weren't all that connected to the psychedelic trance scene in the beginning.
- In 1991, some guy came back from Goa and said, "hey, listen guys. They're playing your music in Goa". And we said "Where? Where is that?" We were quite surprised. In Israel, trance has always been huge.
- Yeah, says Lior. It's bigger than pop music. There is not a car that goes by where you don't hear some electronic music coming out of it. It's probably because Israelis really need to break free, at least in their minds. With the current political situation, Israel really is a pressure pot. There is a lot of stress, so people need this. They need to fly in their minds.
Hard to live in Israel
And Astral Projection provides the opportunity. There is nothing political about that, and yet, in some way it is very political. Perhaps in the very rejection of politics. At the time of the interview, Israel and the Palestinians were desperately negotiating a peace treaty in the United States. The negotiations, of course, later broke down.
- We try to stay disconnected from the political situation, because it can be very depressing, says Lior. We have to stay pure and naive in our music. We used to live in the city, but we've actually moved into the country-side for that reason. Five days of the week, I'm just home and don't even leave the yard. It's hard to live in Israel with the political situation being as it is, and it's very hard to avoid it because it's everywhere around you. Even if you don't know what is going on, you can feel the pressure.
That pressure is bad for a band that specializes in creating powerful surges of wide-eyed, boundless, mindless joy. For Avi and Lior, creating music is a spiritual need, and their spirits are high. Don't expect any horrorcore angst tracks in the near future.
- I don't think it's in our nature, confirms Lior. We could try to make a dark psychedelic down-under song, but it always ends up being a nice uplifting, happy track.
People can fly
Astral Projection is growing into a "band" in the rock definition, having left their anonymous compilation days behind them. This new role means remixing Faithless tracks and playing concerts for thousands of people in Mexico City. While being slightly uncomfortable about the live situation ("getting lost in the studio is the best time, ever"), they seem happy with the development.
- Ten years ago we were underground for the sake of being underground. Today it is the exact opposite, says Lior. We want as many people as possible to listen to our music. That's the greatest trip a musician could have. And we do this for satisfaction, to satisfy our needs to make music. You always have to be ready to take your music to the next level.
That is the structure of trance, and of Astral Projection. The climbing ever upward from one level to the next. Like this night in Arvika, Sweden, after the rain.
First, there's a faint pulsing sound. Standing in a crowd of maybe a thousand people, you can physically feel an expectant tension building around you as the sound picks up speed. The build up reaches its peak, a slight pause follows and then the frantic beats kick in. People start jumping, and melodies weave their way around the beats, angelic voices drifting into their midst.
Saying, people can fly. People can fly. The beats intensify, the lights from the stage bathe us in colour and tired dancers pick up their jumping again. Forever and ever.
Thursday, June 14, 2007
Astral Projection talks to i:Vibes about their work 2002
Saturday, August 26, 2006
Astral Projection talks to i:Vibes about their work 2002
Astral Projection is soon to release their new album Amen (October 22nd). In that context we got in touch with Avi Nissim, half of Astral Projection, and fired
a bunch of questions at him about their upcoming album, earlier work, greatest experiences and lots more. This also marks the start of a new era at i:Vibes, the coverage of Goa and Psycedelic trance!
Being one of the oldest bands in the scene Astral Projection have made a great impact on many of todays dj's and producers. They are the frontiers when it comes to their style of music and especially fellow Israelian artists have followed their footsteps with great success!
Big thanks from i:Vibes to Avi for answering all of our questions in such a thorough way!
Here we go...
i:Vibes: Could you tell us a bit about yourself? Hobbies or interests, pets, girlfriends, job maybe?
Avi: I`m 34 years old ( married + 1 daughter ), Lior is 31 years old ( married + dog ).
Our hobbies: movies, photographic, video, computers, animations, painting, sport ,internet ,jewels.
i:Vibes: How did your musical career start? How did the two of you come together? Have you always been fans of dance music?
Avi: Lior & me first got into dance music around 1988 when acid house got started in U.K. We`d already been making music for a few years, but our biggest influence around then was the first acid tracks compilation. Until that, we were both into heavier post-industrial electronic music-anything from Neon judgement to Spk, from Kraftwerk to psychic tv to skinny puppy.
When we started making music around 1983 we had a Yamaha dx7 and dx9, a Roland juno 106 , a kawai R 100 drum machine and an old commodore 64 computer running dr t`s kcs software. Somewhere by 1988 we started making dance music together as SFX. In 1994 we became Astral Projection.
i:Vibes: Most have the opinion that your music is something inbetween goa and psytrance! And most dance artists in Israel produce psychedelic trance! What do you think distincts your music from the rest of the Israelian producers?
Avi: The concept of Astral Projection from the beginning, since the days of SFX in 1988, was first of all music, regardless of fashions coming and going.
All along the way we're trying to preserve the concept of very high standards. Production, musical ideas, reach imagination, and very pedantic control without compromise. We spend many hours in the studio, about 14 hours a day, and work on an album about 9 months (just like pregnancy).
We don't allow ourselves to release a product that we are no satisfied with. If you browse through our computer, you'll find enough material to more than 200 albums, that might have make others content, but that were not good enough for us. You can play, for example, a track we made in 1994, and you'll see people are still enjoying themselves and dance to it madly, like it was made today, in the year 2002. And this is actually the main idea, regardless of time and fashion, keeping the quality without compromising.
Of course, with the passing of time, experience and knowledge accumulated from album to album, we added more equipment, in order to be able to make without borders and obstacles, whatever is on our minds, no encountering technical limitations.
i:Vibes: You guys have been producing for a long time, and are well known to alot of people, but how did you start producing? What got you into producing trance?
Avi: Actually, when we started producing trance, back in '88, we were dealing with electronic music. We basically created a new line that didn't really exist around the world. The name 'trance' arrived after many changes.
Names like 'acid house', 'techno', 'new beat', always paralleled our musical creation patterns. In 1993 it was 'trance' and there it stayed. So you can say we understood that we make trance, when this scene was actually born.
What got us into producing trance was the unlimited freedom a musician can reach through working in a midi studio with electronic equipment. You program a sound from zero, and the sky is the limit. The possibilities are huge, opposing standard instruments, which basically stay with the same sound character.
Another thing was the possibilities in instrumental music, which speaks for itself, without a leading singer.
i:Vibes: You have been very quiet for a long time within the trance scene, but now your new album is getting released on Phonokol the 21st of October, any news on the production? What style will the album be in, will it maybe sound like your older work?
Avi: We are releasing the album on our own label Trust in Trance. Phonokol are our partners for many years.
We were working on our artist's album AMEN for almost two years and we had plenty of materials. We wanted it to be perfect album from all aspects, as well as maintain our integrity.
During these two years, we tested the new tracks at parties for our crowd. The tracks which received positive energies from the crowd, we marked as the tracks which work for us. It took us time, but we are so lucky that no one measured our studio hours with a stopwwatch. We recorded the entire album in our two studios. A good and interesting album must contain new ideas, new sequences and new sounds. The easiest would be to re-cycle ourselves, but we didn't want that. We kept the Astral's concept with our typical sounds, but with new elements in the audio work.
i:Vibes: What are your musical influences? Is it from older dance music acts or dance acts at all?
Avi: Our musical influenced come from anything that sound good, unique ideas, it`s not necessary have to be trance, anything goes ... from Kraftwerk to Madonna.
i:Vibes: Do you have a busy schedule at the moment? We at i:Vibes wonder if you will ever come to Scandinavia or the UK again to perform?
Avi: These days we don't have time to breathe ... we are working so hard, every weekend we are finding ourselves in different places all over the world ... we are coming to Scandinavia during march 2003, UK shows will start from we are planning to do a launce party for Amen across 4 continents April June 2003.
U can get updated through our web site: www.astral-projection.com go to live shows section.
i:Vibes: You are now done with the Amen album, what other projects do you work on now?
Avi: We plan a new album release August 2003. all ready in a deep process!
There are so many plans and some are still confidential but here's some:
There's a plan for a long tour in the U.S.A for the beginning of july 2003 - San Francisco - L.A - NY.
We plan to peform in Goa this year and a short trip to Brazil.
We plan a remix album of all our classics tracks, performed by top Trance musicians that you all know well. No dates yet, still at work proccess.
Around April we plan a release of a new Israeli Psychedely Trance Vol. 6, and yes ... DVD including tv-interviews,live shows, studio work, making of, video clips for our classics tracks ... no date yet.
i:Vibes: Which new Israelian artist do you think have the most potential to come a long way within music? And who do you think is the best producer in the scene at the moment?
Avi: Israeli trance rules! & Big Time! & Full Power!
We look at the new generation artists like: Alien Project, Astrix, Atomic
Pulse, Dynamic, Sesto Sento, they are all braking everywhere & we are very
happy to see the scene grows & we are glad to inspire so many talented
artists & opened the door for Israeli Trance music to be so recognized &
well admired around the world.
The best producer at the moment is Avi Algranati from Space Cat.
i:Vibes: How is the clubscene in Israel these days? Do you prefer to do your performances in your home country? Or do you have your greatest fans and largest orients elsewere?
Avi: In Israel the Trance did caught "Big time". We have got the best musicians, we have the best audience in the world, an audience that knows what he wants, audience that knows what he is going to get when he comes to a party. The un-bearable political situation, the everyday terrorists attacks, people are in constant tension, they don't know where & when & what will happen the next day, who shall live, & all of that means - Pressure!
Where would you go to release all of that - if not to a M.F Trance party - to forget all the bullshit, & believe me, here, in Israel, we know how to unwind & explode.
I do not believe that there is a situation like that on any other place in the world! I'm in tour with Astral Projection since '94, we have been to many places, & Experienced quite a bit. We always say that for us there are no differences between the countries we are playing at. People everywhere are reacting in the same sympathy & frenzied to our music. I love it - a 0-nation party, One family.
Today, from some reason the Club Trance appeals to many people. It's not that the people don't want Intelligence Trance anymore.
People don't have the mood due to the terror & current political situation. The situation, in which police trash the parties, arrests the musicians & Party-goers.
This is an un-acceptable situation. People had enough from the police trashing the party, they had it with the drug dealers, the criminals who come to spoil the parties. People prefer to go to the big raves, to the Club-Trance where the police do not show up from some reason.
In Israel people loves Tiesto very much, all the Club Trance elite. At the moment people do not go out so much due to the political situation, no one wants to explode from a suicide-terrorist in the middle of a party. That's why "Astral" are performing now mainly outside of Israel. We prefer to play in a party, in which we can be sure that will not be closed, without the absurd situations of police chases.
i:Vibes: When and where did you have your best experience performing live? How did that affect your work?
Avi: It's a tough question. Each party has its own magic - the place, the view, the people, & there were plenty of parties. I think Goa '99 was one of the best in our career. We played most of our music from many years for many hours. The crowed knew all the tracks. It was in Anjuna's Flee market.
It was a party that was organized in a few hours. People kept asking us when the party is, & we were there just for a holiday! We didn't plan anything. We realized that something has to be done & we got it together with a place, sound system & Baksheesh. In few hours we were surrounded by 2,000 people who came out of knowhere! I like this kind of parties. I remember another one in Fuji Mt. in Japan, a party under an active volcano. It was a party inside a cloud. Beautiful scenery & great crowd!
i:Vibes: Whats your current favourite track? And favourite track of all time?
Avi: Current favourite track: Astral Projection - Chaos (from the Amen album).
Favourite track of all time: M.W.N.N. - Teleport.
i:Vibes: Most people are familiar with tracks of yours like 'Mahadeva' and 'People can fly', which one of your tracks do you think is your best track ever produced? And Why?
Avi: They were all our sons. (ha, ha, ha)! If you insist. Let There Be Light, People Can Fly, Dancing Galaxy, Life on Mars, Chaos, Nexuses, Aurora b ... ( I cant stop ;-) Liquid sun, Mahadeva, Power Gen... Track is made by hard work. There's no such thing as wham bam thank you mam, and here we have a track. It's a hard work. Starting with the sound programming, sitting a lot of in front of the computer.
i:Vibes:How has your writing changed over the years, is there a particular way you write a track? Why do you think you've always produced that incredible up-lifting anthemic sound?
Avi: Starting from a certain base line that's on, adding many layers of different roles that all along the creation keep on changing. Sometimes a certain role that is created inspires the next role and the evolving of the track.
First of all we create some raw material that is on the computer way before the editing. Even in the editing stage we keep changing things, adding or changing roles according to changes created while editing, every role waits for the right time and the right entrance, and every role gets the respect it deserves, that's why our tracks are long.
When we enter the studio to work on an album, there is no chance we will release something that we don't love or aren't not content with. Every time we enter the studio to work on an album we are very excited and without this excitement there is no point for the whole thing. The mix stage, which is the final and last one, closes the process of making the track. This process usually takes us about a month. But for us a track is perfect only after we checked it in a party and we saw the audience respond, the audience is for us an active partner in all we have released so far.
We write, arrange, and do sound programming all together. There's no single formula for the duo to put a track together though. We start a track off with a sampler, a melody line, a groove, a TB 303 sequence. Then we quickly start work on the bass and drums and build it up from there. The sounds and the mixing are worked on as we compose. It can take us from two weeks to a month to finish a track because we have the luxury of owning two professional recording studios.
i:Vibes: Who came up with the idea to your classic music-video 'People can fly'? Did it take long to produce, and was it costly (considering the computer-generated 3d-graphics were a lot harder to create those days)? Do you feel your international break-through came through MTV and other music-tv-channels?
Avi: 'People can fly' & 'Dancing galaxy' videos were made with our team, friends, the best Israeli animators. We have the best people in Israel ... this days we are working on Amen video.
This track is about the current stage of the world, a state of a war, we are on the verge of a third world war. This is a prayer for universal peace and a wish for Utopia, that we wish was possible. It expresses a wish for a world peace. soon u will be able to see it on MTV!
Regarding your qoustion about the international break through ... it's still so hard to push trance into main stream ... u wont be able to see our videos running with Madonna ... u could find them only on a special programs like 'party zone' ... but I believe that in time this will change ... most of the world is already prepared for this trance revolution!
i:Vibes: Is there any producer you would like to collaborate with? If so how do you think that will end up?
Avi: We have been collaborate with: Dado from Trance wave, Triliton & MFG.
From time to time we are doing remixes: we did 'God is a DJ' for Faithless ... 'Aqua line spirit' for Electric Universe ... 'Trance dance' for Triliton.
These days we`ve just finessed for Domestic 'Pure nrg' ( it`s going to be release in Transient records in a few weeks ), but ...mostly we prefer to work together ( Lior & me ).
i:Vibes: Do you have any disguises? Do you produce under any other names than just Astral Projection?
Avi: Yes we have, but it`s a big secret ... ;-) .
i:Vibes: Finally, is there anything you would like to say to your fans and i:Vibes visitors?
Avi:I would you like to say to our many fans:
We were nothing with out your love & without your support.
At our web site - www.astral-projection.com - we receive hundreds of e-mails from fans who expresses their love & this is the most exiting thing in the world for us!
Thanks alot for listening:
Avi Nissim
Astral Projection
www.astral-projection.com
Astral Projection talks to i:Vibes about their work 2002
Astral Projection is soon to release their new album Amen (October 22nd). In that context we got in touch with Avi Nissim, half of Astral Projection, and fired
a bunch of questions at him about their upcoming album, earlier work, greatest experiences and lots more. This also marks the start of a new era at i:Vibes, the coverage of Goa and Psycedelic trance!
Being one of the oldest bands in the scene Astral Projection have made a great impact on many of todays dj's and producers. They are the frontiers when it comes to their style of music and especially fellow Israelian artists have followed their footsteps with great success!
Big thanks from i:Vibes to Avi for answering all of our questions in such a thorough way!
Here we go...
i:Vibes: Could you tell us a bit about yourself? Hobbies or interests, pets, girlfriends, job maybe?
Avi: I`m 34 years old ( married + 1 daughter ), Lior is 31 years old ( married + dog ).
Our hobbies: movies, photographic, video, computers, animations, painting, sport ,internet ,jewels.
i:Vibes: How did your musical career start? How did the two of you come together? Have you always been fans of dance music?
Avi: Lior & me first got into dance music around 1988 when acid house got started in U.K. We`d already been making music for a few years, but our biggest influence around then was the first acid tracks compilation. Until that, we were both into heavier post-industrial electronic music-anything from Neon judgement to Spk, from Kraftwerk to psychic tv to skinny puppy.
When we started making music around 1983 we had a Yamaha dx7 and dx9, a Roland juno 106 , a kawai R 100 drum machine and an old commodore 64 computer running dr t`s kcs software. Somewhere by 1988 we started making dance music together as SFX. In 1994 we became Astral Projection.
i:Vibes: Most have the opinion that your music is something inbetween goa and psytrance! And most dance artists in Israel produce psychedelic trance! What do you think distincts your music from the rest of the Israelian producers?
Avi: The concept of Astral Projection from the beginning, since the days of SFX in 1988, was first of all music, regardless of fashions coming and going.
All along the way we're trying to preserve the concept of very high standards. Production, musical ideas, reach imagination, and very pedantic control without compromise. We spend many hours in the studio, about 14 hours a day, and work on an album about 9 months (just like pregnancy).
We don't allow ourselves to release a product that we are no satisfied with. If you browse through our computer, you'll find enough material to more than 200 albums, that might have make others content, but that were not good enough for us. You can play, for example, a track we made in 1994, and you'll see people are still enjoying themselves and dance to it madly, like it was made today, in the year 2002. And this is actually the main idea, regardless of time and fashion, keeping the quality without compromising.
Of course, with the passing of time, experience and knowledge accumulated from album to album, we added more equipment, in order to be able to make without borders and obstacles, whatever is on our minds, no encountering technical limitations.
i:Vibes: You guys have been producing for a long time, and are well known to alot of people, but how did you start producing? What got you into producing trance?
Avi: Actually, when we started producing trance, back in '88, we were dealing with electronic music. We basically created a new line that didn't really exist around the world. The name 'trance' arrived after many changes.
Names like 'acid house', 'techno', 'new beat', always paralleled our musical creation patterns. In 1993 it was 'trance' and there it stayed. So you can say we understood that we make trance, when this scene was actually born.
What got us into producing trance was the unlimited freedom a musician can reach through working in a midi studio with electronic equipment. You program a sound from zero, and the sky is the limit. The possibilities are huge, opposing standard instruments, which basically stay with the same sound character.
Another thing was the possibilities in instrumental music, which speaks for itself, without a leading singer.
i:Vibes: You have been very quiet for a long time within the trance scene, but now your new album is getting released on Phonokol the 21st of October, any news on the production? What style will the album be in, will it maybe sound like your older work?
Avi: We are releasing the album on our own label Trust in Trance. Phonokol are our partners for many years.
We were working on our artist's album AMEN for almost two years and we had plenty of materials. We wanted it to be perfect album from all aspects, as well as maintain our integrity.
During these two years, we tested the new tracks at parties for our crowd. The tracks which received positive energies from the crowd, we marked as the tracks which work for us. It took us time, but we are so lucky that no one measured our studio hours with a stopwwatch. We recorded the entire album in our two studios. A good and interesting album must contain new ideas, new sequences and new sounds. The easiest would be to re-cycle ourselves, but we didn't want that. We kept the Astral's concept with our typical sounds, but with new elements in the audio work.
i:Vibes: What are your musical influences? Is it from older dance music acts or dance acts at all?
Avi: Our musical influenced come from anything that sound good, unique ideas, it`s not necessary have to be trance, anything goes ... from Kraftwerk to Madonna.
i:Vibes: Do you have a busy schedule at the moment? We at i:Vibes wonder if you will ever come to Scandinavia or the UK again to perform?
Avi: These days we don't have time to breathe ... we are working so hard, every weekend we are finding ourselves in different places all over the world ... we are coming to Scandinavia during march 2003, UK shows will start from we are planning to do a launce party for Amen across 4 continents April June 2003.
U can get updated through our web site: www.astral-projection.com go to live shows section.
i:Vibes: You are now done with the Amen album, what other projects do you work on now?
Avi: We plan a new album release August 2003. all ready in a deep process!
There are so many plans and some are still confidential but here's some:
There's a plan for a long tour in the U.S.A for the beginning of july 2003 - San Francisco - L.A - NY.
We plan to peform in Goa this year and a short trip to Brazil.
We plan a remix album of all our classics tracks, performed by top Trance musicians that you all know well. No dates yet, still at work proccess.
Around April we plan a release of a new Israeli Psychedely Trance Vol. 6, and yes ... DVD including tv-interviews,live shows, studio work, making of, video clips for our classics tracks ... no date yet.
i:Vibes: Which new Israelian artist do you think have the most potential to come a long way within music? And who do you think is the best producer in the scene at the moment?
Avi: Israeli trance rules! & Big Time! & Full Power!
We look at the new generation artists like: Alien Project, Astrix, Atomic
Pulse, Dynamic, Sesto Sento, they are all braking everywhere & we are very
happy to see the scene grows & we are glad to inspire so many talented
artists & opened the door for Israeli Trance music to be so recognized &
well admired around the world.
The best producer at the moment is Avi Algranati from Space Cat.
i:Vibes: How is the clubscene in Israel these days? Do you prefer to do your performances in your home country? Or do you have your greatest fans and largest orients elsewere?
Avi: In Israel the Trance did caught "Big time". We have got the best musicians, we have the best audience in the world, an audience that knows what he wants, audience that knows what he is going to get when he comes to a party. The un-bearable political situation, the everyday terrorists attacks, people are in constant tension, they don't know where & when & what will happen the next day, who shall live, & all of that means - Pressure!
Where would you go to release all of that - if not to a M.F Trance party - to forget all the bullshit, & believe me, here, in Israel, we know how to unwind & explode.
I do not believe that there is a situation like that on any other place in the world! I'm in tour with Astral Projection since '94, we have been to many places, & Experienced quite a bit. We always say that for us there are no differences between the countries we are playing at. People everywhere are reacting in the same sympathy & frenzied to our music. I love it - a 0-nation party, One family.
Today, from some reason the Club Trance appeals to many people. It's not that the people don't want Intelligence Trance anymore.
People don't have the mood due to the terror & current political situation. The situation, in which police trash the parties, arrests the musicians & Party-goers.
This is an un-acceptable situation. People had enough from the police trashing the party, they had it with the drug dealers, the criminals who come to spoil the parties. People prefer to go to the big raves, to the Club-Trance where the police do not show up from some reason.
In Israel people loves Tiesto very much, all the Club Trance elite. At the moment people do not go out so much due to the political situation, no one wants to explode from a suicide-terrorist in the middle of a party. That's why "Astral" are performing now mainly outside of Israel. We prefer to play in a party, in which we can be sure that will not be closed, without the absurd situations of police chases.
i:Vibes: When and where did you have your best experience performing live? How did that affect your work?
Avi: It's a tough question. Each party has its own magic - the place, the view, the people, & there were plenty of parties. I think Goa '99 was one of the best in our career. We played most of our music from many years for many hours. The crowed knew all the tracks. It was in Anjuna's Flee market.
It was a party that was organized in a few hours. People kept asking us when the party is, & we were there just for a holiday! We didn't plan anything. We realized that something has to be done & we got it together with a place, sound system & Baksheesh. In few hours we were surrounded by 2,000 people who came out of knowhere! I like this kind of parties. I remember another one in Fuji Mt. in Japan, a party under an active volcano. It was a party inside a cloud. Beautiful scenery & great crowd!
i:Vibes: Whats your current favourite track? And favourite track of all time?
Avi: Current favourite track: Astral Projection - Chaos (from the Amen album).
Favourite track of all time: M.W.N.N. - Teleport.
i:Vibes: Most people are familiar with tracks of yours like 'Mahadeva' and 'People can fly', which one of your tracks do you think is your best track ever produced? And Why?
Avi: They were all our sons. (ha, ha, ha)! If you insist. Let There Be Light, People Can Fly, Dancing Galaxy, Life on Mars, Chaos, Nexuses, Aurora b ... ( I cant stop ;-) Liquid sun, Mahadeva, Power Gen... Track is made by hard work. There's no such thing as wham bam thank you mam, and here we have a track. It's a hard work. Starting with the sound programming, sitting a lot of in front of the computer.
i:Vibes:How has your writing changed over the years, is there a particular way you write a track? Why do you think you've always produced that incredible up-lifting anthemic sound?
Avi: Starting from a certain base line that's on, adding many layers of different roles that all along the creation keep on changing. Sometimes a certain role that is created inspires the next role and the evolving of the track.
First of all we create some raw material that is on the computer way before the editing. Even in the editing stage we keep changing things, adding or changing roles according to changes created while editing, every role waits for the right time and the right entrance, and every role gets the respect it deserves, that's why our tracks are long.
When we enter the studio to work on an album, there is no chance we will release something that we don't love or aren't not content with. Every time we enter the studio to work on an album we are very excited and without this excitement there is no point for the whole thing. The mix stage, which is the final and last one, closes the process of making the track. This process usually takes us about a month. But for us a track is perfect only after we checked it in a party and we saw the audience respond, the audience is for us an active partner in all we have released so far.
We write, arrange, and do sound programming all together. There's no single formula for the duo to put a track together though. We start a track off with a sampler, a melody line, a groove, a TB 303 sequence. Then we quickly start work on the bass and drums and build it up from there. The sounds and the mixing are worked on as we compose. It can take us from two weeks to a month to finish a track because we have the luxury of owning two professional recording studios.
i:Vibes: Who came up with the idea to your classic music-video 'People can fly'? Did it take long to produce, and was it costly (considering the computer-generated 3d-graphics were a lot harder to create those days)? Do you feel your international break-through came through MTV and other music-tv-channels?
Avi: 'People can fly' & 'Dancing galaxy' videos were made with our team, friends, the best Israeli animators. We have the best people in Israel ... this days we are working on Amen video.
This track is about the current stage of the world, a state of a war, we are on the verge of a third world war. This is a prayer for universal peace and a wish for Utopia, that we wish was possible. It expresses a wish for a world peace. soon u will be able to see it on MTV!
Regarding your qoustion about the international break through ... it's still so hard to push trance into main stream ... u wont be able to see our videos running with Madonna ... u could find them only on a special programs like 'party zone' ... but I believe that in time this will change ... most of the world is already prepared for this trance revolution!
i:Vibes: Is there any producer you would like to collaborate with? If so how do you think that will end up?
Avi: We have been collaborate with: Dado from Trance wave, Triliton & MFG.
From time to time we are doing remixes: we did 'God is a DJ' for Faithless ... 'Aqua line spirit' for Electric Universe ... 'Trance dance' for Triliton.
These days we`ve just finessed for Domestic 'Pure nrg' ( it`s going to be release in Transient records in a few weeks ), but ...mostly we prefer to work together ( Lior & me ).
i:Vibes: Do you have any disguises? Do you produce under any other names than just Astral Projection?
Avi: Yes we have, but it`s a big secret ... ;-) .
i:Vibes: Finally, is there anything you would like to say to your fans and i:Vibes visitors?
Avi:I would you like to say to our many fans:
We were nothing with out your love & without your support.
At our web site - www.astral-projection.com - we receive hundreds of e-mails from fans who expresses their love & this is the most exiting thing in the world for us!
Thanks alot for listening:
Avi Nissim
Astral Projection
www.astral-projection.com
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