Volume 17 of this series opens with a feint: Cynq's 'Fractured Reality' stretches across seven minutes at 94 BPM in B minor, as if the trip were in no hurry at all. Then 'South X' by Yons and Del Torto vaults to 152 and lays out the record's plan: crests and valleys, surge and recovery, no permission asked. The first real crest arrives early —Guacamoe's 'Metamorphose' sets the speed ceiling for the entire volume, 160 BPM dispatched in under five minutes— and so does the first deep valley: 'The Last Man Standing', a three-way effort from Dream Pixx, Astrologic and Voyd Realm, sinks to 91.
'Relativity', the long mile
Just past the halfway mark, Caront and Mobius (BR) plant 'Relativity': nine minutes and one second at 107 BPM, the longest stretch on the record and the pause that resets the pace before the home straight, which is where the storied names show up. Rinkadink —the South African has two decades in the industry behind him and has played some of the world's biggest psytrance festivals— teams up with ØMEN (JP) on 'Strength in Repetition', 150 BPM in G minor that live up to the title. Four cuts later, Portugal's Paranormal Attack, active since 2001 and authors of the album 'Phenomenon' (2006), sign 'ECOS' at 146.
The closer mirrors the opening: Traumtänzer's 'Echoes Of Bliss' brings everything back down to 93 BPM and E minor, closing the circle where it began, in slow territory. There is a reason such a jagged journey holds together: LW Recordings is the compilations arm of the UK's Label Worx and builds these volumes by crossing the catalogues of independent labels, which is how Brazilian, Japanese, South African and European names end up sharing one voyage. Heard front to back, it works less like a continuous set and more like an expedition with base camps: climb the peak, catch your breath, climb again.
Sources: LW Recordings · Solar Tech Records · Wikipedia
