V/A In Praise Of Shadows (DCD Album – Thank You For The Horse)
Genre/Influences: Hard-techno, hardcore.
Background/Info: Thank You For The Horse (TYFTH) is a Japanese label based in Tokyo and specialized in hardcore and hard-trance music. I’m not that familiar with this kind of music when it comes to make reviews, but I think this sampler featuring 24 songs is worthy of examination. Some bands have been featured with more than one track.
Bands: Proteus, Guld, Hase, Grimsoul, Pain On Creation, Steve Morley, Nomic, Aryx, Qygen ao.
Content: I honestly never heard before of all the bands featured on this compilation. I realized that it mainly consists of ‘older’ cuts, but still featuring rather unknown projects in the scene. The bands are clearly dealing with a hard and even somewhat industrial-like techno format. That’s why it’s called ‘hardcore’ and ‘hard trance’. I simply experience it as a hard-techno format with great and often astral-like sound treatments. With a typical goa-kick some of the cuts would definitely sound in the old goa-trance style. This is not easy and cheap techno music or techno for sissies, this is a heavy format.
+ + + : This is the kind of sampler I particularly like as it allows me to discover bands from a genre I’m not familiar with. This is the power of a sampler. I can’t say I like all of the cuts, but I’m especially into the harsher sound treatments and astral-like sound effects. It sounds powerful and straight forward-orientated. I also discovered well-crafted and masterly produced compositions sometimes featuring great stereo effects. The artistic digipak format also is a good reason to invest!
– – – : As I already mentioned all the songs couldn’t convince me and I even discovered a few ‘cheap’-sounding projects. The main point however is that you really have to be in this kind of music because after awhile it all starts to sound pretty similar.
Conclusion: Thank You For The Horse gave me the opportunity to discover a few great sound wizards or should I say techno alchemists?!
Best bands: Re-form, Carbon Based & DJ Rx, Alek Száhala, Proteus.
Rate: (7).
Label: http://thankyouforthehorse.com / www.facebook.com/tyfth
Since you’re here … … we have a small favour to ask. More people are reading Side-Line Magazine than ever but advertising revenues across the media are falling fast. And unlike many news organisations, we haven’t put up a paywall – we want to keep our journalism as open as we can. So you can see why we need to ask for your help. Side-Line’s independent journalism takes a lot of time, money and hard work to produce. But we do it because we want to push the artists we like and who are equally fighting to survive. If everyone who reads our reporting, who likes it, helps fund it, our future would be much more secure. For as little as 5 US$, you can support Side-Line Magazine – and it only takes a minute. Thank you. The donations are safely powered by Paypal.
