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Betwixt & Between

Posted by PlasmaDancer on October 7, 2012
Posted in: Japanese. 23 comments

Betwixt & Between (Kaoru Kimura) has tragically passed away at the age of 28. As the news is now public knowledge, Guld has invited condolences/messages of support to be posted on Kaoru’s Facebook page wall, Twitter account, or mailed directly to Guld (NRG_JAPAN [at] hotmail.com), who will then forward them to Kaoru’s family.

Having only recently heard of his passing, I am still at a loss for words. A fantastically intelligent, thoughtful and kind young man, he will be missed by everyone who met him, and also by members of the wider scene who knew him through his emotional, influential music.

I feel very fortunate to have counted Kaoru as a friend for the past five years, and will miss him dearly. I’m sure everyone here will join me in offering condolences to all of his family.

Thanks for everything, Kaoru. 安らかにお眠り下さい。

Tyranoid / Strongstream – Tracks Unleashed EP

Posted by PlasmaDancer on October 1, 2012
Posted in: Finnish, Releases. Leave a Comment

Fans of acid-meisters Tyranoid and Strongstream are in for a treat this week, with the release on FINRG of the Tracks Unleashed EP. A new tune will be added every day this week, all from the guys’ back catalogue, and first up is their recent remix of Wayne G’s Twisted. Featuring some great sounds/progression in the second half, this is a quality track to start things off, with a Cyrez remix on the way for tomorrow.

Substanced & Alchemiist – Permission to Die

Posted by PlasmaDancer on October 1, 2012
Posted in: Finnish, Releases. Leave a Comment

With the Smiling Corpse releases, Proteus’ faster tracks and a semi-comeback from Kreatrix, this year is quietly becoming quite a good one for darker freeform. Now we can add the latest Substanced & Alchemiist track to the list, as Permission to Die is one of the most exciting tunes I’ve heard for a while (even with some very strong competition).

Chip made a good point on Substanced’s SoundCloud that PtD has more than a hint of Pain on Creation about it – add in Alchemiist’s NRG influence and Substanced’s now distinctive sound, and you have a proper anthem in the making.

Midnight Mess 10th Anniversary Special, 29th September

Posted by PlasmaDancer on September 30, 2012
Posted in: Events, Japanese. 3 comments

Thinking it was long overdue to pay a visit to gothic/industrial event Midnight Mess, I headed along to Shinjuku’s MARZ last night. It turned out that this was the very last event (in its current incarnation as a monthly party, at least), and was also marking its 10th anniversary.

Thanks to the joys of work I wasn’t able to arrive until the evening (it was actually a massive 11-hour spectacular starting at 5.30pm), but it did mean that I was just in time for Winterkälte’s stupendous Live PA. I wasn’t familiar with their work at all (embarrassingly, as it looks like they’ve been active since the mid-90s), but this was an incredible set of hardcore, noise and heavy industrial-style sections. Getting close to breakcore on occasions, it was all a bit much for the more delicate goths in the crowd, but with a lot of industrial dancers and a few NRGetic Romancer/Dark Dimension ravers in attendance there were plenty who quickly settled into the higher bpms.

Horzi – The Elegy (Substanced remix)

Posted by PlasmaDancer on September 30, 2012
Posted in: Finnish, Mixes, Releases. 3 comments

Here’s a nice surprise upload from Substanced, for fans of the Hybridize sound of a few years ago. Horzi’s The Elegy was an amazing track that inspired a couple of remixes, and Substanced typically took the high-bpm filtered-freeform route with his 2009 rethink. This tune has happy memories for me as it finished off my NRGetic Romancer x Hybridize set, a mix that drove me totally insane during planning but thankfully turned out ok in the end.

A great track then, but most likely limited to 100 downloads – you know what to do. edit: Actually limited to 1000 downloads, but best to grab it asap anyway – who knows when freeform’ll become the next big thing? 

Tyranoid – Darkform

Posted by PlasmaDancer on September 30, 2012
Posted in: Finnish, Mixes. Leave a Comment

One set I forgot to mention recently is this new trip into darker territory courtesy of Tyranoid. While not quite reaching the heights of Elder Signs, this is still a very nicely selected hour of industrial-to-freeform that once again should be popular with fans of both styles. Heading into the NRG and freeform in the second half, the gradual progression into Al megiddo is fantastic, with a lovely edit at the end to finish things off.

Jon Mysterave – Everybody Loves Kreatrix

Posted by PlasmaDancer on September 27, 2012
Posted in: Canadian, Mixes, UK. 3 comments

Another great set this week comes courtesy of Custom Built DJ’s Jon Mysterave – a nicely selected tribute to Kreatrix. With its firm commitment to the dark side and a relentlessly high bpm, Twisted Freq’s label was in many ways ahead of its time, so praise be for sets like this that remind both veterans and rookies of the good old days. Tracks like Wannabe Gansgstah and Danse Macabre aren’t heard too often anymore, but here sound as good as ever alongside classics like Unleashed and Exaltation. Kudos to Mr Mysterave too for spreading out the ‘breakbeat tunes’, giving a really nice overall rhythm to the mix.

Make the extra effort to negotiate the not-so-familiar TempoPlus site, this one is really worth a download.

Watchtower Vol.2 pre-orders open

Posted by PlasmaDancer on September 27, 2012
Posted in: Finnish, Releases, UK. 3 comments

The big news this week is of course the almost-release of Watchtower Vol.2, an amazing follow-up to Vol.1 with an even better looking tracklist. Headlining tunes for the deeper freeform brigade are probably Re-form’s fabulous Decade and the wonderfully constructed Polaris by Aryx, but there are also great sounding freeform (and electro-freeform?) tracks from Substanced and Grimsoul. That’s before we even get to what might be the main event – a brand new track from Carbon Based that genuinely brings back memories of FINRG in its prime.

As well as all that, one of the other main highlights is a free download! Qygen’s Temporal Temple is a beautiful tune that has become one of my firm favourites – if I’m ever booked to play in a club again I’d love to see the reaction to that breakdown and drop.

All in all, a superb-looking release that has every base of the quality-freeform scene well and truly covered. To pre-order head over to the Watchtower site, where there’s also an offer on for folk who missed Vol.1.

Dyzphazia – Freeformaniacs 6

Posted by PlasmaDancer on September 24, 2012
Posted in: Drum & Bass, Finnish, Japanese, Mixes, UK. Leave a Comment

Endless commutes and 6-day workweeks are back again, meaning lots of time to check out the latest cluster of freeform sets. My favourite so far has to be Dyzphazia’s newest effort for the evergreen Freeformaniacs show, a wonderful selection of melodic, twisty freeform. This time around my pick of the connections is the early Bass Dust – The Dome transition that does a superb job of switching up the atmosphere, but the whole set is top quality and easily one of Dyzphazia’s best this year. A must-listen, then.

1 ) Re-Form – Silver Cube (Extended Mix) [CDr] 
2 ) Noisia – Dustup [Vision Recordings] 
3 ) Blokhe4d & Receptor – Bass Dust [Bad Taste] 
4 ) Alchemiist – The Dome [CDr] 
5 ) Pain On Creation – Lush (Fatal Error Edit) [FiNRG] 
6 ) Nomic – Mekhanika Child [CDr] 
7 ) Carbon Based – Dark Side [FiNRG] 
8 ) Douglas & Lost Soul – False Sense Of Security [NuEnergy] 
9 ) Nightforce – Symphony For The Devil [Electronica Exposed] 
10 ) Wyrm & Surtr – Yggdrasil [Ruffbeatz/Freeformaniacs] 
11 ) Helical & Oli G – Days Of Thunder [Camel Records] 
12 ) Helikaon vs. Ephexis – Illiad [NuEnergy] 
13 ) Aryx – Aurora (Substanced Unfinished Forever Remix) [CDr] 
14 ) Le Dos-On – Sena [SPLASH! Energy Records] 

Hardcore Awards 2012

Posted by PlasmaDancer on September 24, 2012
Posted in: Events, UK. 3 comments

The voting is now open for Hardcore Heaven’s Awards, with a few new categories that’ll give some very welcome exposure to the freeform scene. Apparently it’s the first year for freeform to have a category of its own (with DJs and producers all under consideration at once), while there are plenty of other sections that might interest the TYFTH crew. Some might bemoan the suggestion here that freeform is just a UK hardcore subgenre (lets not start that tedious debate, mind), but surely anything that brings in new listeners and draws attention to the talented and hard-working members of our scene is a Good Thing indeed.

The ‘Stage 2’ voting is open until 5th November, so there’s still plenty of time to register your picks.