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Comment by macNchz | Hacker News Reader

I’ve enjoyed listening to psychedelic electronic music while programming since discovering Shpongle twenty years ago. I feel like it helps my brain get into the right mode somehow. I’m not familiar with the definitions of a lot of these sub-taxonomies but interested in listening to them!

I have a coding playlist I’ve put together over the years that is more towards the psybient/chillout end but includes some trance as well, I like the variation in speed and intensity: https://spotify.link/CHSvf399YDb

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Divine Moments of Truth is an amazing piece of music that I think could appeal broadly to fans of classical/art music, electronica, EDM, rock, etc. More people should listen to Shpongle.

I remember ... the very first time ... I programmed in C

Thanks for sharing that playlist. Happily a fair few of those come up with the little green heart - a very encouraging sign.

Reviewing the playlist highlighted that Spotify, for some reason, no longer has Smoked Glass and Chrome (Blumenkraft) available, or at least it's not available in AU / for me. The rest of the album remains available, but that track is just spectacularly good.

I bought the album off bandcamp ages ago, so it's only mildly inconvenient, but in turn highlights the annoyance of music brokers like Spotify silently dropping items from their catalogue.

Yeah several of the tracks are unavailable to me in the US. It’s one of my least favorite things about the move towards streaming music generally–the ability to listen to music I love being subject to the whims of business people and lawyers’ disagreements.

I still have a large digital library of “owned” music (the core of this playlist I think dates back to files purchased from the iTunes Music Store the first year it launched in 2003), but the convenience of streaming has gotten me out of the habit of maintaining it.

Try Hallucinogen’s In Dub, and In Dub Live.

I once saw Simon in a massive rave as Hallucinogen from 4am to 8am and Shpongle from 12pm to 3pm. Those Gamma Goblins still travel trough my spine.

A true connoisseur!

Great album–there are two tracks on that playlist from it!

If you like Shpongle, I recently bought a new album, Transient States - Ballade en Forêt, that sounds very derivative (in a good way!).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dLLzz4vxKb0

Hallucinogen In Dub (remixed by Ott) is another gorgeous album. Ott has a bunch of his own albums too.

I see a lot of H.U.V.A Network and Carbon Based Lifeforms. I'm mainly a trance lover, but when I get tired of it, these are the two I switch over to and start expanding from.

> I see a lot of H.U.V.A Network and Carbon Based Lifeforms.

This [0] is more psyambient, isn't? I hate typecasting into genres, but I always saw that as the more chill-side of that version of EDM whereas psytrance was more like Alwoods [1], E-Mantra or Capsula etc...

I spent many HDDs streaming SomaFM and got to listen to a ton of it, but there was a notable difference when those tracks drop in not just tempo/BPM and bassline sigs.Cosmic Leaf Records was a really cool label that used to deal in both sounds as their artists had lots of cross-over.

And thanks to this thread I just found out CBL dropped an album this year, going to go deep on that later this week. Still rinsing World of Sleepers after all this time.

0: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ly4KqXUE0F4 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cMy1pB4NG10

Definitely more of psy chill/ambient than trance. I tend to like moving between psytrance and psybient–too many hours of trance alone makes me feel like my brain is vibrating inside my skull!

thanks, my only comment on this topic was going to be "where can I find more like shpongle". Well, I guess the second comment would be "when will somebody make a Generative Shpongle?"

I use this site fairly often to just browse stuff that comes up for bands I like. YMMV.

https://www.music-map.com/shpongle

Walter Ego, Celtic Cross, Ott, Globular, Entheogenic, Younger Brother, Desert Dwellers, Jaia, Western Rebel Alliance, and the list goes on

If Simon Posford is involved, give it a listen. Much better than some “AI” generative model

I highly recommend Posford's "The Herb Garden" from Mystery of the Yeti Part 2 (released as a Hallucinogen track before he seemingly switched to doing all of his chiller music with Raja) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Nce44osPpE

Celtic Cross, Ott, and Entheogenic are phenomenal as well.

I'd recommend Third Ear Audio, Carbon Based Lifeforms, Kuba (specifically the album Through a Lens), Phutureprimitive, Saafi Brothers

If you're ever looking to put on a few hours of something and want an epic thematic journey spanning 2 albums, try "When the silence is..." by Koan - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IBksiW_3dCY

edit: I'm not sure what genre this fits under, but the album "Deliverance" by Culprate reminds me a lot of Shpongle in ways that it has no right to, since... I'm pretty sure it's not psychill/psytrance

> Phutureprimitive

Ah man, his early stuff still holds up; but when he started to get into 140 (Dubstep) I just couldn't get into it; I had been in that sound since 2006 and while I appreciate him expanding as an artist, it was just off-putting.

Mark Pritchard on the other hand (1/2 of Global Communication) had a much better go of it and even got a release(s) on Deep Medi for example.

Thanks for the link to Mystery of the Yeti, I hadn't heard that- and it sounds almost exactly like Shpongle (I think even some of the samples are the same).

Shulman is one of my favourites - i wish they still made music. Incredible incredible music - not just for psytrance, just in general. Also recommend Bluetech.

Zero Degrees is one of the trippiest songs of all time.

"random thoughts" is pure class.

In Search of a Meaningful Moment will remain in my top 10.

I always enjoyed this review from Discogs [0]:

"Just turn off the lights, forget the TV and the computer, close the windows and listen to this album with max volume. Spend some time in a different world created by Shulman. You'll be amazed with the effect this album will have on you, trust me!"

Wherever you are Yaniv, I hope you're well.

[0] https://www.discogs.com/Shulman-In-Search-Of-A-Meaningful-Mo...

agreed - i installed a very very sizeable car audio system in my car years ago - and Shulman as the review states = an incredible sound world, and most probably missed by most - absolutely sublime in the low end...im talking with a 15 inch, 1500W sub powering the show....just jaw dropping augmentation of reality...without drugs :P

Laugh all you want, when I was like 12 years old my family was into this weird techno-pseudoscience-cult of "Ramtha's school of enlightenment" and they have the biggest trance/shamanistic playlists, we had these long ceremonies of hours of dancing while listening to music like this and drinking red wine and smoking tobacco on pipes. I guess if it wasn't for the alcohol I would have remembered all these amazing songs but well... I think that sect is still alive and I wish they had a playlist somewhere outside their website coz I can't stand the website much due to the religious content bringing back drunk memories. If you know of such a playlist please share

Can you elaborate on your experience at Ramtha, and what lasting effect it had on your psyche/moral compass?

The bad: I was an alcoholic and smoked from age 12 to age 30. The community builds a level of arrogance that they have access to special knowledge because they are in a specific stage in the evolutionary "destiny". Breaking bonds with other family/friends is almost needed because you don't hear their points anymore, just like scientology or other closed sects, not sure their proper name. You think you have a guardian angel too that your destiny is to survive and become enlightened and you shouldn't have fear, I had a couple of near death experiences because of this false sense of security, plus the constant wine drinking... The good: they pack a lot of trigonometry and algebra but then they teach you "sacred geometry"... They also teach basic quantum mechanics basics, but then teach you that the observer effect is controlled by our minds, or that you can transform a carrot into gold... So somethings are useful... I'm still recovering from these cults, it's crazy how much our minds can change, therapy takes a while to take and forgetting/re-learning also takes its time, as it should...

Ramtha's School of Enlightenment used to come to a university I used to work at between sessions while the students were away. They would have a section of paddock fenced off and would wander around it blindfolded making "PSSHHTT" noises to stop running into each other (I assume). They definitely seemed like a peculiar bunch.

Even seated you would make these psssshhht sounds of pushing air out, you would end up sweating from a meditation session because your muscles would also be contracted as you focus on the hand position in your chest... In your mind you have to visualize words backwards and breath them out letter by letter... I still laugh at the "so be it" that has to be said with absolute certainty for your wishes to come true

Also try Aes Dana, Scann-Tec, Solar Fields

Check out Benji Vaughan (the other half of Younger Brother along with Simon Posford), and his harder alias, Prometheus.

his first solo album under his own name, Even Tundra, is incredible

He just dropped a new album, Eidolon, last week. It's wonderful!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ljzFWdax0iE&list=PL44Q4mKIiC...

Thanks for sharing. Super awesome and will check it out fully! (It's saved after an hour+ of listening)

Easily Embarrassed is a band worth checking out. Same with Vibrasphere.

If anybody here is in the Seattle area and wants to check out a show or jam, please email me!

Love Shpongle, saw him for the first time last year (as Simon Posford live) and it blew my mind.

He's playing in Denver for 2 shows on Halloween weekend btw! I'd catch him since he's technically "retired"

Never thought I would see Ott mentioned on HN!

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