Psychedelic trance

Psychedelic trance, psytrance

  just psy is a form of electronic music characterized by hypnotic arrangements of synthetic rhythms and complex layered melodies created by high tempo riffs. It first broke out into the mainstream in 1995 as the UK music press began to report on the trend of Goa trance. Since then the genre has grown immensely and now offers much variety in terms of mood, tempo, and style. Some examples include full on, dark, progressive, suomi, psybreaks and psybient. Goa Trance continued to develop alongside the sub genres.

From the 1980s psychedelic music began to be revived within forms of electronic music, often connected to the rave subculture, and leading to a host of sub-genres, including acid house, trance and new rave.

Acid house

 

Main article: Acid house

A smiley face, often used as a symbol of acid house

Acid house originated in the mid-1980s in the house music style of Chicago DJs like DJ Pierre, Adonis, Farley Jackmaster Funk and Phuture, the last of which coined the term on his "Acid Trax" (1987). It mixed elements of house with the "squelchy" sounds and deep basslines produced by the Roland TB-303 synthesizer. As singles began to reach the UK the sound was re-created, beginning in small warehouse parties held in London in 1986-87. During 1988 in the Second Summer of Love it hit the mainstream as thousands of clubgoers travelled to mass raves. The genre then began to penetrate the British pop charts with hits for M/A/R/R/S, S'Express, and Technotronic by the early 1990s, before giving way to the popularity of trance music.

Trance

Main article: Trance music

Trance music originated in the German techno and hardcore scenes of the early 1990s. It emphasized brief and repeated synthesizer lines with minimal rhythmic changes and occasional synthesizer atmospherics, with the aim of putting listeners into a trance-like state. Derived from acid house and techno music it developed in Germany and the Netherlands with singles including "Energy Flash" by Joey Beltram and "The Ravesignal" by CJ Bolland. This was followed by releases by Robert Leiner, Sun Electric, Aphex Twin and most influentially the techno-trance released by the Harthouse label, including the much emulated "Acperience 1" (1992) by duo Hardfloor. Having gained some popularity in the UK in the early 1990s it was eclipsed by the appearance of new genres of electronic music such as trip-hop and jungle, before taking off again towards the end of the decade and beginning to dominate the clubs, with DJs including Paul Oakenfold, Pete Tong, Tony De Vit, Danny Rampling, Sasha, Judge Jules and in the US Christopher Lawrence and Kimball Collins. It soon began to fragment into a number of subgenres, including progressive trance, acid trance, euro trance, goa trance, psychedelic trance, hard trance and uplifting trance.

New rave

Main article: New rave

In Britain in the 2000s the combination of indie rock with dance-punk was dubbed new rave in publicity for The Klaxons and the term was picked up and applied by the NME to a number of bands, including Trash Fashion, New Young Pony Club, Hadouken!, Late of the Pier, Test Icicles, and Shitdisco. It formed a scene with a similar visual aesthetic to earlier rave music, centred around visual effects: glowsticks, neon and other lights were common, and followers of the scene often dressed in extremely bright and fluorescent coloured clothing.