No NRGetic Romancer this time/Japan Times – the link

Posted by PlasmaDancer on October 19, 2008
Posted in: Events, Japanese. Leave a Comment

I’ve had to miss my first NRGetic Romancer for a long time – I actually had a job interview this morning, and thought it might be pushing things to go to NRGetic Romancer last night, and then be suited up and heading for an interview at 11 the next morning… I’ll do my best to get the news on what happened in my absence, though (I already know that Betwixt played some new tunes).

Anyway, I bought a couple of copies of The Japan Times this afternoon, and the Hell’s article has a prime spot in the Time Out entertainment/reportage section, complete with a photo of Zio (and a slightly weary-looking me). It’s been posted up on the JT website too – complete with the photos that you will have mostly seen before – check it out here. By the way, when I’m talking about ‘the kick anchoring the track etc etc’ in the article, I was actually trying to explain hardstyle, not hard dance as a whole – just in case you’re wondering… I tried to shoehorn in some comments about the Finnish scene too, and they just about made into print, plus a reference to Alek Szahala.

The Japan Times/Event photos

Posted by PlasmaDancer on October 16, 2008
Posted in: Events, Japanese. 1 comment

Hard to believe, but Sunday’s edition (19th October) of national newspaper The Japan Times will carry a small feature on last month’s Hell’s Gate! One of the JT’s esteemed writers was at the event, and had a few words with me, Zio and some other ravers while taking in a few of the DJ sets (take-de-x, Zio’s hardstyle, mine and Stanfield’s). Aside from an article or two about Guld in Loud magazine, the scene is much too small to have been picked up on by any other media, and so this sort of publicity really is great news for Hell’s. I’m guessing that the article might appear online too – I’ll make sure to post up any links, if so.
You might also remember me mentioning some upcoming photos from the last event? Well, here they are, a couple of which might even be used in the upcoming article. All credit goes to Our Man Hickey.

[above] Cogi, PlasmaDancer, Guld. / Me again – mid-set this time.

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Tokyo Hardcore Construction, 2nd November

Posted by PlasmaDancer on October 13, 2008
Posted in: Events, Japanese. Leave a Comment

There seem to be a lot of THC events lately, and here’s another – once again at Studio Cube, the lineup’s looking very tasty. No Betwixt & Between, but DJs of the calibre of Lunch, Kanon, Technetium, Stanfield and others means that this is one not to be missed. There’ll also be a free mix CD for anyone turning up, so that seals it for me, I think.

Lunch (TOKYO HARDCORE CONSTRUCTION/S.H.C.)
NDE (NIGHTMARELAND)
DJ Stanfield (IROCEP)
Kanon (A.I.N.)
狗神 (NIGHTMARELAND)
DJ WILD PARTY (赤線企画)
DJ Technetium vs. MC Tyrant (Cis-Trance)
LALA (LoveScreamTerror/SUPER GABBERS)
Yusuke & Gokuraku (adrenalin)

Massive – The Resurrection Party @ GALLERIA DEI SERPENTI, 17th October

Posted by PlasmaDancer on October 9, 2008
Posted in: Events, Italian, Japanese. 1 comment

Here’s the first of what I hope’ll be many Italian-related posts – the upcoming Massive event on the 17th of this month. DJ BRK (the man responsible for bringing Guld to Italy next month) will be playing alongside Plus DJ, Child of Sorrows and AKT, and as you can see from the back of the flyer, pretty much every hard dance genre is covered. You might also notice that Thank You For The Horse is listed among the event’s supporters (as well as Hell’s Gate and NRGetic Romancer) – it’s a real honour, and hopefully this will be the start of a link between events here and in Italy.

[above] Here’s the banner image from the Massive flyer – awesome, no? You might have guessed that I wasn’t the one who came up with this, so a million thanks are owed to Nightforce this time, instead.

[above] While this is the new Hell’s Gate logo, courtesy of Pecori. The flyer for next month is under construction at the moment, so there might be a few changes for that version.

Hybridize on Bassoradio

Posted by PlasmaDancer on October 8, 2008
Posted in: Finnish, Releases. Leave a Comment

Recently Proteus’ Bassoradio programme held a special Hybridize showcase, and you can catch a really nice selection of the new sublabel’s releases, including Nomic’s absolutely beautiful Extinguish as the opening tune. The interview with DJ Swoosh and Epyx & Cyrez is probably very interesting too, but I haven’t a clue what they’re talking about. It’s in Finnish, you see. Anyway, highly recommended, and you can download it here.

NRGetic Romancer Records on Trackitdown

Posted by PlasmaDancer on October 8, 2008
Posted in: Japanese, Releases. Leave a Comment

It’s taken a long while to get going, but Guld’s NRGetic Romancer Records has finally got some releases on Trackitdown. There are a few older releases, such as Nightmare Freak and the original/remix of Nish’s Heartbreaker, but also some long-awaited newies – Guld and Betwixt & Between’s Hatral, and the Guld remix of Proteus’ I See The Things That You Don’t See. Jupiter probably won’t be seeing a release though, as that’s already been signed up to the Quake Trance label. Still, it’s not every day that NRG releases see the light of day in Japan, so this is a very Good Thing indeed.

The Prodigy – One Love

Posted by PlasmaDancer on October 5, 2008
Posted in: Releases, UK. Leave a Comment

While there’s not too much going on, let’s have a listen to another classic from back in the day. I might have given up on The Prodigy ever since they released Firestarter, but that doesn’t change the fact that they were one of the most influential sounds of early 90s electronica. One Love isn’t my favourite Prodigy tune, but that break at 1.15 used to give me the same feeling I get now from the ‘grinding sawtooth + kick’ in modern FINRG/JNRG. I remember wishing that it would go on for a good couple of minutes….And what about that drumbeat, eh? They knew what they were doing back then, no doubt…

PSYENOUGH vs Hell’s Gate, Shinjuku M’s, 4th October

Posted by PlasmaDancer on October 5, 2008
Posted in: Events, Japanese. Leave a Comment

Hello, I’ve been a bit lazy for the past week – but thankfully not too much seems to have happened in the freeform world, so I’m safe.

Anyway, I managed to get to the Enough/Hell’s event last night, and it was good fun. Shinjuku M’s is located smack in the middle of Tokyo’s biggest red-light/gay district, and not somewhere I frequent too often. Cue me getting lost among the dodgy side streets,  and no doubt looking like someone in search of just the right kind of host/hostess bar while I gazed at all the signs.

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Tokyo Hardcore Construction mix archive

Posted by PlasmaDancer on September 27, 2008
Posted in: Events, Japanese, Mixes. 2 comments

Tokyo Hardcore Construction is almost happening as we speak – I can’t make it this time, but my girlfriend is probably going. Anyway, for folk like me who can’t get to the event, we can create the same atmosphere in our own homes (minus huge speakers and a crew of cybergoths) with a huge crop of gabber/NRG/all sorts of other stuff mixes over at the THC archive. I must admit that I haven’t had time to listen to all the sets yet, but for freeform fans the standout will surely be Betwixt & Between’s hard NRG mix, the tracklist of which is as follows:

  1. Nomic – Make Me Real
  2. Alek Szahala – Superstition
  3. Marco V – Godd (Tyranoid/Strongstream extended remix)
  4. Eclipse – Stairway to Brooklyn
  5. Distressed Frequencies – Victimized
  6. Alek Szahala – Anmitzcuacua
  7. Alek Szahala – Firecloud

Pretty tasty, no? It gives a really good idea of Betwixt’s NRG/freeform influences, and is very nicely put together – dark and extremely hard, with an interesting choice of Stairway to Brooklyn in the middle there.

I also have to recommend the mixes by Lunch (quite possibly the finest gabber DJ in Tokyo) and Kanon, also a master of ‘real’ dark gabber (rather than the demented anime-style efforts of Sharpnel et al).