Schlagwort-Archive: Trance

Psychick Warriors Ov Gaia – Maenad (1991)

„PWOG were a Dutch collective operating at their peak in the early 90s. Text on the back of their records invited „those who wish to get the most out of their lives“ to contact the Katharos Foundation, or De Tempel, which has the Psychick TV logo next to it. I’m not sure how much any of them had to do with the latter; maybe they were hoping for greater interrest and intrigue by virtue of association.
Whatever their personal politics or beliefs, they were creating some perfect music at this time. They were pretty good at ambience – there’s some great stuff on the ‚Ov Biospheres And Sacred Grooves‘ LP, and the Obsidian 12″ was an encapsulation of the ‚ambient techno‘ sound and concept. It’s their dancefloor stuff that I keep going back to. This 12″ in particular, although Exit 23 is pretty good. The influences of the Belgian Nu-Beat sound, that was popular in the mid 80s with bands like Front 242 is clear on this 12″ – the shuffling beat that is instantly recognisable. But there was a lot more on top of that beat – PWOG were superb programmers of percussion, generally tending toward a tribal feel, most evident on ‚Ov The Maenad‘, with its weird manic bagpipe effect. My favourite is the ‚Beyond‘ version. Super deep, with trancey (circa 1992) synths, and great use of reverb to give this a driving feel. Awesome – perfectly encapsulating the feel of a dank club at 4am, with just a single laser and some dry ice.
Later on they managed to get Coil to do a remix for them – which not a lot of artists can boast – included here, as is their fabulous remix of Orbital’s Lush – another minimal marathon, although I would be quite happy if it went on for another half an hour.“ (http://stance-out.blogspot.com/2009/07/psychick-warriors-ov-gaia-maenad-plus.html)

PWOG bei Wikipedia (en)

Psychick Warriors Ov Gaia – Obsidian (Organically Decomposed) (1992)


Reinhören
„The lineup for Psychick Warriors Ov Gaia — Reinier Brekelmans, Bobby Reiner, and Robert Heynen, with soundman/producer Tim Freeman — originally played in an industrial band called the Infants in 1985. Later in the ’80s, the group appeared as Sluagh Ghairm (Spirits Cry), but by the end of the decade they had become known as Psychick Warriors Ov Gaia — the name signifying membership in the Temple Ov Psychick Youth, the occult collective founded by Psychic TV’s Genesis P. Orridge (though Psychick Warriors weren’t connected musically to Psychic TV). In 1990, the band released their debut single „Exit 23,“ a minimalist trance epic with a haunting vocal sample from Timothy Leary („return, to the source“). As with all their future work, it appeared on Belgium’s Kk Records. The second single, „Maenad,“ was an upbeat tribal house mover, also focused squarely on the dancefloor.

The 1992 debut album, Ov Biospheres and Sacred Grooves, showed that Psychick Warriors could straddle the fence between floor-filling organic trance and dark ambience quite well. On tracks such as „Obsidian“ and the Drum Club remix of „Exit 23“ (added to the American Restless release), the chilling ambient groove easily overpowered any textured beats.

After a single release for „Obsidian“ and the Heynen/Freeman side project called Disciples Ov Gaia (on which they remix „The Key,“ from Ov Biospheres and Sacred Grooves), Heynen left to form Exquisite Corpse, a group that focused on the minimal tribal rhythms evident on „Maenad.“…“ (http://www.answers.com/topic/psychick-warriors-ov-gaia)