Few compilations dare to program 'Brain Killer', a 154 BPM missile, next to Humate's Space Edit of 'Ninety-Seven Stars', listed at 66. That extreme spread is no accident but a thesis: this trawl through the vault of Superstition Records — the Hamburg label born in 1993 that powered early German trance — works because it keeps reaching for the opposite pole of every gesture.
Oliver Lieb, four masks
The most eloquent contrast comes from a single man. Oliver Lieb appears on seven of the 21 cuts under identities that barely resemble each other: floating and melodic as L.S.G. on 'Fragile' and 'Hearts', abrasive as Azid Force on the aforementioned 'Brain Killer', cosmic alongside Torsten Stenzel on Paragliders' 'Oasis', hypnotic as S.O.L. on 'Polarlicht', and remixed by Push on 'Subraumstimulation'. The record backs it up: the Frankfurt producer worked under dozens of aliases through the nineties, and L.S.G. debuted on Superstition itself in 1993. Hearing him wear so many skins here is a crash course in his range.
The other extremes draw the map:
- Length: Digweed & Muir's Bedrock Mix of Humate's '3.2' stretches to 12:21, nearly double 'Fragile' (6:27) — proof the label was at home in both the miniature and the mural.
- Temperature: the hypnotic B major trance of 'All Those Trees' against the 154 BPM techno of Humate's remix of Steve Bug and Phax's 'Tri Top'.
- Historical weight: 'Schöneberg' in its Man With No Name Remix and the closing 'Loops & Tings' by Jens — two foundational anthems of the catalogue — sit beside oddities like D-Saw's 'Track 10:30'.
From Velocity's opening 'Uplift' to the final Fruit Loops Remix there is no dancefloor arc, only complete cartography: the distance between its extremes is the exact measure of everything Superstition managed to cover in a single decade.
Sources: Wikipedia · Labelindex · Bandcamp