platonicliquid

I find myself in Europe for a week or so (from Australia) from the 6-15 August and would love to go to a psybient event while I'm here... Can anyone recommend an event that isn't too far from civilization? (I won't have a car) I'm currently in Geneva, Switzerland Would have loved to go to Ozora, maybe another year Thanks!

I think this simple statement is powerful. Rhythm is the heart-pulse of an individual, extended to that individuals community. It unifies the one with the many, and the many with the one. It forms the rich tapestry on which healthy societies are built. FOLI (there is no movement without rhythm) Wider society has lost its rhythm, after many years of economic oppression dressed as religious and state persecutions, aiming to deprive us of our self-direction through fear - the many have become disconnected from the one. Slowly we are rediscovering rhythm, and gaining a deeper understanding of the difference between rhythm (as self-direction) and arrhythmia (as a top-down system of control) Projects such as festivals, drum circles, unite us in rhythm, and while yes, it's a great party - the importance of being able to dance to a unified beat is essential if we ever hope to break away from the machine that is the market economy. While we are dancing this is something that is felt, an intuitive understanding, that isn't often understood through words. Thoughts?

Knowing reality, is to be reality. Trying to understand the objective reality (ie beyond our senses) via our senses is, you'll agree, an exercise in futility. To see further, we must be able to experience reality, *be* in reality. Otherwise all we are doing is describing it through clumsy tools such as language, maths, science. It's a little like, to use a music analogy - digitising a vinyl. You will never replicate the wave, all you will have is many samples of that wave. In the end, you have a very realistic looking reality in front of you, but actually, it is just a low-res 64kbps version of reality with jpeg encoding errors and missing blocks.

I've always seen psybient as a subset of goa-trance, myself - not especially related to psytrance, it incorporates organic/cultural/(outer)world sounds which gives it its unique characteristics. Early goa sounds combined with ambient sound and other chill genres such as dub. Here's an Alan Parsons project track featuring Shpongle. Artists like Eat Static, Suns of Arqa, and later Shulman were also instrumental in bringing in modern psybient sounds. I think the beauty of psybient is that it is so inclusive of other genres while still predominantly using the 4/4 time signature - and it's a constantly evolving sound.

It's summer in Australia and I'm heading to Rainbow Serpent in Melbourne at the end of the month! Second time going and can't wait to go back. If I have any spare money during the year I'll hopefully be going to a few smaller Australian festivals as well - if they have any chill acts, of course

I would love to see more music production resources and discussions, perhaps we could commission some 'master classes' with psybient producers?

I can see how the psy crowd not drinking enough would be an issue! This is likely why so many festivals are now integrating more mainstream music stages and combining them with bars. The only alternative would be to host an illegal house/loft party, and charge admittance - but that is risky both financially and security-wise.

I'm re-listening to Pistolero - Juno Reactor (Bombay Orchestra Remix) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x1TaOvvj5CA

I've only seen a few live acts - Shpongle (DJ Set) at Earthcore in Melbourne was right up there - I saw Juno reactor live at the Brewery in Byron Bay this weekend, and it blew my mind - I'm not usually into too much uptempo stuff, but juno Reactor manages to maintain melody while delivering amazing structure through beats. Fantastic performance - the dancer was fantastic as well. I would love to see a full Shpongle live tour.

Yestegan chaY - Yeh Estekan Chaee

http://www.psytrancefestivals.com/calendar/ I like

I'm heading to France from Australia, and hoping to see what European festivals are like I'll be staying around a month, and so ideally I would like to visit a couple of festivals around Europe. Can anyone suggest anything? Obviously I'd prefer festivals that also have chilled sets on their programme.

We went down this long weekend ...and it was fantastic! Had a blast. Everyone was so awesome - the volunteers were friendly and helpful, the festival was sustainable and made huge efforts to minimise the environmental impact of having so many people in one place - compost toilets, recycling facilities, regular garbage collection... and festival goers appreciated the effort and as a result were happy to help keep the place clean The festival organisers were working closely (I believe) with Boom Festival organisers who have been organising sustainable festivals for many years now. The workshops were topnotch, the panels/discussions were amazing with guest speakers from around the world speaking on various issues... the crowd was orders of magnitude better than the one that attended Earth Core. And of course the music. Oh my. On top of the heavier stuff there were dedicated stages for chill/psybient and progressive stuff, as well as a stage for live music acts, featuring a whole number of different genres. Other festivals could learn from Rainbow Serpent. No complaints whatsoever, had a mind-blasting weekend of non-stop crazy fun and learning. I'll be going back next year!

I haven't been yet - I had been to Earthcore http://www.earthcore.com.au/ end of last year - and you're right - the atmosphere was definitely lessened by the wrong sort of crowd - lots of juice heads and people from the general EDM/trance crowd (the festival also catered to this crowd by introducing non-psy acts) - I met some lovely people, but found that I mostly wanted to stay with the group I was with. The arts and culture parts of the festival were a sick twisted joke. But! I got to see Shpongle (the reason I chose to go) and a few other acts i wanted to see (Shpongle and Raja Ram played their sets then practically ran off stage and away from the festival) - the sheer amount of trash left behind after the festival was disheartening. I've *heard* that Rainbow Serpent has a better vibe to it, and I'm keeping my fingers crossed.If it doesn't pan out, I'll be looking to smaller/lesser known festivals (or go overseas!) to get my music fix. I'm very much looking forward to Desert Dwellers and Beats Antique this time around. I found an official retrospective from last year's festival