DJ Basilisk’s Essential Selections: Top Ten
The Early Years 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 Top Ten Hall of Fame
Coming up with an all-time top ten list of any sort of music isn’t easy. I had enough trouble compiling the Hall of Fame from the huge number of recommendations I’ve made for this Essential Selections project of mine. Initially I tried to make just one top ten but it wasn’t working–so now there are three, one each for what I feel are some of the primary divisions in the music covered here in the guide. (Obviously it would be possible to make lists of more specific styles.) At this point these lists are very preliminary; I haven’t totally made up my mind about what should be where. Actually, I’m not sure if I ever could. Still, they seem solid enough to share for discussion. So here we go: ten of my all-time favourite albums in three categories: classic Goa trance, psytrance, and chill out…
Goa Trance
#10
Pigs In Space
#9
Man With No Name - Moment Of Truth
#8
Total Eclipse - Delta Aquarids
#7
Jaïa - Blue Energy
#6
Dimension 5 - Transdimensional
#5
Astral Projection - Trust In Trance
#4
Koxbox - Dragon Tales
#3
Hallucinogen - The Lone Deranger
#2
X-Dream - Radio
#1
Pleiadians - I.F.O.
Psytrance
#10
Infected Mushroom - Classical Mushroom
#9
Nuclear Ramjet - Mission To Sedna
#8
Ticon - Zero Six After
#7
Spirallianz - Stereopark
#6
12 Moons - Solid State
#5
Prometheus - Corridor Of Mirrors
#4
Cosma - Nonstop
#3
Double Dragon - Continuum
#2
Tegma - Around The World In 80 Minutes
#1
Jaïa - Fiction
Darkpsy
I’ve had many requests for a separate darkpsy top ten so here it is :) still in flux!
#10
Furious - Supremacy
#9
Xenomorph - Qlippoth
#8
V/A - The Void: Disintegration
#7
Fragletrollet - Playground Of Spirit
#6
Mubali - Shenanigans
#5
Ghreg On Earth - Sigilweaver
#4
Procs - Stuck In The Oven With Me
#3
Gappeq - Speaker Seeker
#2
Derango - Tumult
#1
Psykovsky - Debut
Downtempo
#10
Saafi Brothers - Midnight's Children
#9
H.U.V.A. Network - Distances
#8
Androcell - Efflorescence
#7
Entheogenic - Spontaneous Illumination
#6
Ooze - Where The Fields Never End
#5
Galaxy - Science Of Ecstasy
#4
Bluetech - Sines And Singularities
#3
Ott - Blumenkraft
#2
Younger Brother - The Last Days Of Gravity
#1
Shpongle - Tales Of The Inexpressible
The Early Years 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 Top Ten Hall of Fame
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Good work, i totally agree with you, no releases from 2009 (Looks like you didn’t pay attention to the past 3 years; Delirious Noon album would have been an great choice) , and no new school Goa Trance (That can not be compiled under the same tree with psy trance), but since the style is actually “new”…
Well i really doubt that one day someone will came out with an album like Tales Of The Inexpressible; i was expecting to see Androcell in the top five, and his other project also (Distant sysetem). A Braincell album maybe, eat static.
Anyway it has been a real pleasue, appreciate the great work. thanks
I’ve just ordered Jaia-Fiction, and Entheogenic-Spontaneous Illumination. For the sake of having a strong Library.
great selection,only gripe is the mystery of the yeti part one should be in the downtempo……
and what about Carbon Based Lifeforms – Hydroponic Garden ??
Great selection! Actually, this is my dream discog… weither in the classics, psytrance or downtempo. I have a few of them and I’m looking foward to complete it…and this is an ultimate guide to do so :)
Although I agree with the mystery of the yeti part 1 and CBL suggestions.
Ah, the art of canon formation and taxonomy is alive and well, even in the least amenable of genres! Great selection, as ever, Basilisk! I wonder if you decided not to include compilations? I would change the title above the classics column to “Goa”, because that is what it is. Where is Hallucinogen’s “Twisted”? For me this is for sure the first, best and most original Goa record ever released, even eclipsing the undeniably great “The Lone Deranger” and “IFO”. I note that most of your chilled material is relatively recent; was this on purpose? I would be very tempted to include some of the old school downtempo stuff like “Mystical Experiences” or “Spaceships of the Imagination” or suchlike. Thanks for your great work and website Basilisk. Dr G ~*~
The lists are good, but I still think they are so wrong. Downtempo needs some more Ultimae, e.g. CBL – Hydroponic Garden…
Shpongle’s first album should be at the top spot, not the second IMO.
Pigs in Space Shouldn’t be there at all, and where is Twisted? Astral Projection should be nearer to #1, and Etnica’s Alien Protein is missing…
oh well, I guess we all can’t agree, but nice list anyway.
I am glad to see this generating some discussion! One thing I should probably point out is that I have avoided putting too many releases by any single artist where possible. So, instead of The Lone Deranger and Twisted I only put TLD, which I prefer. Likewise, only one Shpongle album and one of the top-level Ultimae releases. I figured it would be better to offer a range of options rather than listing off Simon Posford’s discography ;) anyway, it’s a work-in-progress that I will revisit sometime soon, thanks for the critiques, suggestions, and feedback!
He’s the man after all…
How about a Darkpsy Hall Of Fame?
Hey Basilisk, I hear what you are saying about not including too many from one artist, and I agree that you probably don’t need more than “Tales of the Inexpressible” in the chill out section, but I still think that a Goa top ten that does not include Hallucinogen’s “Twisted” is missing THE album that made history by igniting a whole new genre in a single stroke of genius. ~*~
What is IM doing so far back in the psytrance rating, I wonder? Crème de la crème, if you ask me.
But opinions are like assholes… :p
any of us should have all these of his/her own
but anyways +1 to DarkPsy Top 10 : )
Really great to see Spirallianz on the list.
Although I am a bit surprised to see Vibrasphere not making it in the downtempo section.
X-dream – radio @ goatrance ???
Classical mushroom as the 10th entry in a psytrance top10 ???
Fraggletrollet & Mubali albums in an all-time dark top10 ???
c’mon…
All seems very subjective and doesn’t really show that you know lots of electronic music releases, even if we focus only on trance or downtempo.
Putting lists together of “what music do i know” every 5-year old can do without any serious knowledge.
Hope you will do it more seriously in the future cause a website like this would make sense. But not this way.
best regards!
It seems very subjective because it is very subjective. I guess you didn’t bother to actually read the page and explore the site.
Totally great to see that you’ve added some new sections to the list.
I say split it up between psy-goa-dark-downtempo and progressive.
You always do a stellar job here my friend – so cheers to you and bollocks to the haters.
these lists work.thanks
Hey Basilisk, here’s a nifty idea. Make more top tens of other genres, progressive, full on, suomi, minimal, techno etc. Browsing through years you can see how many different styles could be in one year. A top ten of different genres will showcase to new listeners what has been going on, sort of like “the story so far”. In fact that’s a nice name for a top ten. Even an underground genre like suomi could spawn ten releases, just Haltya is worth adding anywhere, that’s the most original stuff I have heard. And maybe showcasing more variety will spawn more variety in music.
We should update the lists, some nice things are going on today (2010)
And for the top ten suomi list, I can’t agree on the basis that the style isn’t that prolific, even though it can be integrated with the dark-Forest list
If you’re interested, my personal Goa top 10 is quite different. In this order:
Hallucinogen “Twisted”
Pleiadians “IFO”
Miranda “Phenomena”
Astral Projection “Dancing Galaxy”
Orichalcum & the Deviant “Orichalcum & the Deviant”
Sandman “Witchcraft”
Etnica “Alien Protein”
Electric Universe “One Love”
Transwave “Phototropic”
The Infinity Project “Feeling Weird”
Thanks ~*~
Hey, how can I download any of these???
can i get the list of tracks too”
m lookin 4 somthin ‘heavyweight’ of infected mushroom,thats my fav.”
“Are You Shpongled” is a far better album than “Tales of the Inexpressible”. Also, “A Flock of Bleeps” is better than “Last Days of Gravity”.
This is nice…but I think Nitzhonot should be here too :)
Anyway, it’s your list, not mine ;)
Thank you so much!!! much love !!! :)
nice list! i always enjoy exploring such lists… “oh look, i got this one too, it’s REALLY a good piece of music”, or “hmm…. didn’t know that one, probably i should check it out” or “what??? THAT awful album??? c’mon, man….!”
of course everybody would do the list in a different way. so disussing about is always fun, but if somebody comes up with comments like “All seems very subjective and doesn’t really show that you know lots of electronic music releases…” (posting by user the truth) … well, then this person surely missed completely the point. how can you expect tolerance and subjectivity by a user called “the truth”???
i think it would also be interesting to make a top ten of favourite tracks. because with albums – esp artist albums, but also compilations – i very often have the problem that there are some amazing tracks on it, but the other are not so good (or even crap), so that the album/compil in total becomes kind of average….
anyway, i tried to compile my top ten albums (not sorted by genre. just all over goatrance, psytrance, downtempo etc. no particular order, no compilations):
- astrix – eye to eye
- hallucinogen – the lone deranger
- the commercial hippies – if you can’t stand the heat
- xerox and illumination – the beast within
- astral projection – in the mix
- prometheus – corridor of mirrors
- shpongle – tales of the inexpressible
- ott – hallucinogen in dub
- blue vortex – mirage
- infected mushroom – converting vegetarians (both “sides”)
cheerz
schlommo
Awesome! Magnus, Greg, & Ghreg made top ten on dark. I love my friends!!
Just some words to say how impressive is the work done to prepare those list.Objective like subjective words belong to human race.Spontaneity is helpfull and opens an access to the discovery.The real polemic comes from the fact that on creating a top ten we forcely restrict the area but it’s clever to have etablished this list as a base to start discussing.I’ll be back soon to suggest some cds missing in that great work.
BRAVO
Definitely agree with your choice for #1. Ground-breaking, earth shattering stiff by SP.
1200 mics (2002) should be here
ime glad to see you got good ears! xenomorph (sold me early on with his releses on koyoti recs) your choices are good but definetly not difinative having danced to or played most of the tracks and albums you listed since 95 and some it feels so good to no others have had so much joy