Psychedelic Trance

Psychedelic Trance

The psychedelic trance, commonly called psychedelic trance or psytrance is a genre of electronic music characterized by hypnotic rhythm arrangements and complex synth melodies created from fast time riffs. It became popular for the first time in 1995, when the British press echoed the phenomenon of goa trance. Since then the genre has grown a lot to offer a great variety of sonorities, times and styles. Some examples include full on, dark psytrance, progressive trance, hard psy and minimal trance.


The first hippies who arrived in Goa, India, in the mid-1960s were attracted for many reasons, including the beautiful beaches, low cost of living, friendly local residents, Hindu religions, spiritual practices and the wide Hindu hashish availability, which was legal until the mid-70's.

During the 1970s the first DJs usually put music from psychedelic rock groups like Grateful Dead, Pink Floyd or The Doors. Since 1979, the rise of electronic music and the beginning of electro made it start to listen in Goa subjects of groups like Kraftwerk. However, it was not until 1983 that the DJs began to move the music of Goa towards the electronics that was sounding at the time in Europe. These include the fundamental Laurent and others such as Goa Gil, Swiss Rudi or Stefano. They all recognize Fred Disko as the pioneer in the introduction of electronic sounds in Goa.1

The trance emerges in Goa from imported records of styles such as italo disco, EBM, new beat, electro, Hi-NRG, synth pop or house. This first trance is configured as a style with its own entity different from the discs from which it originates thanks to the following elements, developed by DJ Laurent: 1

The original discs were manipulated, eliminating most of the vocal parts, except those with a spiritual or apocalyptic content.
In Goa, unlike the Western world, it was taped because the vinyl could not withstand the heat and humidity of the place. This was important in order to re-issue the original compositions, both for the elimination of vowels and for the extension of instrumental parts especially hypnotic.
Time was manipulated, slowing down to 100 BPM or accelerating to achieve different effects.
The result took the form of an extended psychedelic Groove. The sessions were very long, of up to ten hours, combining different sonorities according to the context and the spirit of the public.


It was impossible to buy this kind of music in stores. Even today most of the psytrance music is sold on the internet and not in physical stores. It is said that the first trance issue to be commercially released was What Time Is Love by the KLF group, which appeared in 1988. However, at the same time goa trance was being created by pioneers such as Art of Trance, Juno Reactor, Eat Static And The Infinity Project.

By 1992 the goa trance scene had a pulse of its own, although the term "goa trance" did not become the label of the genre until about 1994. New artists appeared all over the world and that was when the first festivals were held Of goa trance, including the Gaia Festival in France and the later internationally famous VuuV in Germany.

In 1993 the first album was released exclusively of goa trance, Project 2 Trance, with groups like Man With No Name and Hallucinogen. The commercial spot of the style was reached in 1996 and 1997. This hype did not last and once the attention died the same happened with the sales, what made that they disappear seals, promoters and artists.

By 1996 music had changed so much with respect to its origins in Goa that the term goa trance did not seem appropriate any longer. Thus came the name trance psychedelic, or psytrance for short, which was coined to refer to these new styles. The multilayer melodies of the Goa Trance were eliminated and a darker and repetitive musical form appeared, centered on rhythm and groove. An album characteristic of this change was Radio, published in 1998 by X-Dream.2

In 2002, the melodies became popular again, which was the beginning of the psytrance full on. The scene consisted of groups such as Talamasca, GMS, 1200 Micrograms, Luminus, Astrix, Skazi, Infected Mushroom, Shiva, among others that managed to set up a new Generation of followers.

There are a multitude of subgenres within the psytrance scene, including minimal / progressive psy, Full-On, Full-On Night, Full-On Morning, Psycore, Darkpsy, Forest, Uplifting, Twilight. There is a whole movement dedicated to reviving the original Goan sound, as advocated by Metapsychic Records and Suntrip Records.


Currently the genre has reached the great majority of corners of the planet, having great scenes especially in countries like Brazil, South Africa, Germany, France, Mexico, Serbia, and many others. Mainly focused festivals in this genre are held in outdoor places and in natural sites far from urban areas, which highlights psytrance parties on many other genres that use locations within the city; In addition the work of the psychedelic decoration in many of the festivales of the sort is remarkable.