Dear Simon,
I feel really sorry for what was happen - I’ve pre-ordered the album, but still I feel no good because of your post… I REALLY-REALLY LIKE WHAT YOU DO - I WANT SHPONGLE TO CONTINUE! Is there a way I can help? I understand, that only one guy cannot handle all the Twisted expenses, still what can I do? Order 10 more CDs? Or should I better just make a donation? Please post a link here for the donation!

i just listened to some samples from the player and it sounds so… different but yet so “shpongle”? :D
i will definitely buy this album no matter what , i will sell my body on the streets if i have to. But it will sure pass some time until it gets here in my country.

Dear Shpongle-lovers! - Most of you have blogs, you can link to this forum topic at your blogs. You can describe the situation there, you can put the link for that .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) in your blogs.

I’m sure this would help! That’s what i just did - and I hope my blog-mates would react.

Shponzie - 28 October 2009 11:45 PM

flavius - 28 October 2009 09:35 PM

alright so this will be treated either as controversial, or as “no duh” - depending on who reads it:

my theory is that the declining psytrance scene is in some way connected to the decline in hallucinogen (esp LSD) use since the small boom in the late 90’s. this is further exemplified by the commercial success of acts like IM and GMS, who have moved on to different markets (in IM’s case the cock-sucking market, and in GMS’s case the eccy filled ibiza market).

another theory i have is that the decline of goa (the place) has also contributed, but i don’t know enough on the topic to make any real claims.

in any case, all our problems would be solved if someone would drop shpongle CD’s with blotter covers out of a plane onto the unsuspecting masses.

we can all dream.

I used to share your opinion but (un)fortunately I’ve come to realize that blotters are not the magic solution. They can be helpful to people but they can be damaging too. It depends on the individual’s mind, mindset and brainchemistry. The stuff is really not suitable to everyone in my opinion… and I hardly dare to recommend anyone to use that stuff anymore. I used to love it to death but the effects are too temporary so I switched to sober meditation…

I’ve not been into psytrance scene since the beginning but I would expect it has grown a lot.
A lot more people know and like the music compared to many years ago. There are a lot more bands… this means more bad music but also more good music.

The masses in general, so not just psytrancers, are suffering a lot from the pressures of daily existance.
There’s a lot of suffering on planet earth… governments are f#cking up the masses, dumbing us down, teaching us to fight eachother… instead of loving eachother.

I hope that psytrance scene will continue to inspire many kids to drop the selfish attitudes and start working to create a better world.
A better world does not come by itself, we will all need to work hard… and try to convince everyone to work hard to change this world for the better.

We can’t sit on our ass and expect the government to make things better.
We should know by now they are about profit, not peace.

People need to wake up to the fact that the world needs their help.
Partying, chasing ecstasies, making new babies and raising new families are all good FUN…
but in my opinion, if other people and animals are suffering we should work to save them first…

Party-addicts can’t save the world cause they’re too busy getting high.
The world needs more activists.

I agree, though I think a little revelry and an occasional reminder of the transcendent is definitely in order once in a while. People get crazy when they take the world too seriously.

It only means nothing when people don’t take their experiences and translate them into a way of living or a coherent set of values. You can tune in, but it gets pretty depressing when you keep hearing the same message over and over because you haven’t made any changes in your actions.

Psy-eletronic music is very valuable because it allows one to change their consciousness to get the bigger picture.

Last thing before the thread is completely off course:

24bit FLAC downloads are a damn good idea. I would definitely pay extra for full resolution tracks. For Twisted, the upside is the bigger the files (say 24/96k or 192k lossless) the less convenient pirating would be and the people that want it would get to hear the music in its full glory. Granted Twisted’s server is up to the task, I would think it would cost very little to do if hi res masters already exist. Alot less than pressing vinyl.

I am pissed off at so many people getting pissed off. :p
I am pissed off @ “creative” types who havn`t created a marketing strategy.
The internet with it’s web2.0 community rewiring is the new breed of internet thus far.
Many independent musicians have made names for themselves through bit-torrent community,
social networking sites, free track a week programs, and a plethora of multimedia: artist/fan created art, remixes, and viral videos.

Where are all the Twisted Records Music Videos? Where are all the desktop backgrounds? OSX/Windows 7/vista themes?
Hey I’m not complaining… thank you thank you for the music, the hard work and the business, it’s your passion and you wish to keep doing it, so I do understand your anger toward the industry/consumer/theif/file sharer. 
But where is the community?

I am a graphic designer / web designer / amateur musician.  I am currently creating my own record label for my local community.  The label is pretty much an excuse to give continuity to a bunch of different local alternative electronica musicians.
I have been developing the art for the next year after the site is launched, I am developing flash games which are a choose your own adventure style music mixing game, among other more basic types of games that play the labels music while you play.
I have a series of viral videos ready to go.  I have a bunch of artist friends who are doing all different types of original animations for music videos.

This idea is all my own, I’m not relying on anyone else for the meat and bones of the project… and I have about 38% complete and I’ve only been working on it for 3 weeks.

I’m just using this as an example of passion.  I make very little money at my job, but I love it, and in the mean time, I am a musician/artist wanting to give other artists the opportunity to learn more, to have continuity in their presentation, to live and breathe new ideas and passionate energy.

TWISTED RECORDS has some of the best artists in the world… musically…
but if you want to keep making music, the only way to embrace this changing age, is to create a very new community, with new continuity… even the word “psytrance” is obsolete and unappealing… psychedelics used to have a sort of unspoken path/voyage they were gonna take you on, but now we need to invent the next state…

the world ending in 2012 is probably bogus, but we should use that anticipation of something happening to birth a new type of artistic community on the net… the new collaboration front…
the artist inside us all, creating, creating, creating…

unless of coarse I am wrong and the new path of artistry is destruction
then, I guess, carry on, if we keep doing what we are doing; we’ll get there soon enough.

Good Luck, I will be buying the album when it comes out.

P.S. Where are all the compassionate people who are absurdly wealthy? LOL

P.S. Where are all the compassionate people who are absurdly wealthy? LOL

compassionate

wealthy

You may choose one

Shponzie - 28 October 2009 11:45 PM

I used to share your opinion but (un)fortunately I’ve come to realize that blotters are not the magic solution. They can be helpful to people but they can be damaging too. It depends on the individual’s mind, mindset and brainchemistry. The stuff is really not suitable to everyone in my opinion… and I hardly dare to recommend anyone to use that stuff anymore. I used to love it to death but the effects are too temporary so I switched to sober meditation…

I’ve not been into psytrance scene since the beginning but I would expect it has grown a lot.
A lot more people know and like the music compared to many years ago. There are a lot more bands… this means more bad music but also more good music.

The masses in general, so not just psytrancers, are suffering a lot from the pressures of daily existance.
There’s a lot of suffering on planet earth… governments are f#cking up the masses, dumbing us down, teaching us to fight eachother… instead of loving eachother.

I hope that psytrance scene will continue to inspire many kids to drop the selfish attitudes and start working to create a better world.
A better world does not come by itself, we will all need to work hard… and try to convince everyone to work hard to change this world for the better.

We can’t sit on our ass and expect the government to make things better.
We should know by now they are about profit, not peace.

People need to wake up to the fact that the world needs their help.
Partying, chasing ecstasies, making new babies and raising new families are all good FUN…
but in my opinion, if other people and animals are suffering we should work to save them first…

Party-addicts can’t save the world cause they’re too busy getting high.
The world needs more activists.

Nice points, but it’s your half-informed activism which scares me.
Activism isn’t zen, a lot of people don’t like typical activists because their ill-informed actions can cause a lot of suffering as well.  It’s the whole “a war needs two sides” sort of battle.  People hate war, yet activism is an opposition to a type of force.  Which creates “sides” and possible a war, where more suffering and more trauma to the human soul can occur.
Meditation is great friend, but psychedelic drugs have their place as well, as a medicine to help people see more clearly, most ‘societal normals’ should have a guide through these intense mind altering experiences.

So what? we fix the world and then what? Would we need activists anymore? Nah. Everyone is perfect in the future… nothing suffers in the future.  Oh yea, it’s heaven and utopia and a pipe dream.  Go earn your eightfold path first and then you can have an opinion on suffering.
Evolution is a subtle sort of kicking and screaming over hundreds of years, but most activists think they can change the world in a few decades, if only more people were activists… lol… what’s the opposite of activism? Lazilists?
Well as I sit here and lazilistly take my lsd, mushrooms and ayahuasca, and let my nervous system flow through my visual cortex and spark imagination into new areas of thought and inspiration, I meditate for three hours, and when I feel that idea come into me, I go to work, creating designs, graphics, posters and music. I go out into the public and paste up posters, paint murals, spray stencils.
Activism is just another form of faith and hope, like any religion, if we do the work/rituals we have faith it will change the world and bring us close to God/utopia…
I’m all for less suffering, but I think we need to come down from our egos and old language first.

Shpongle is art… art is a form of zen activism… or lazilism.

Through being content with the concept of suffering and death, we dampen our fear, and we can be happier healthier people who treat each other with more respect…
Subtly is our friend.

It’s not 2012 anymore, it’s 2208: http://www.rnw.nl/english/article/end-world-not-nigh

+1 for 24bit flac downloads.  i would definitely buy more twisted music if this was available.  currently have all the shpongle/yb albums on vinyl but the first yb album wasn’t isn’t on vinyl :(

also twisted, i’m a programmer and can easily give you a simple way of watermarking flac downloads so they can be traced.

i’d be happy to do this for free if it helps you out.

Shponzie - 28 October 2009 11:45 PM

Party-addicts can’t save the world cause they’re too busy getting high.
The world needs more activists.

it’s funny how some people associate lsd with partying. i associate it with thinking.

Funny, we’ve gone from:
impressions of an unreleased album;
to a few of Twisted’s problems;
to the demise of Twisted;
to the battle of generations and what is considered theft;
to “THE END OF THE WORLD”...

Exaggerated much?

Where to now?

flavius - 29 October 2009 07:31 AM

Shponzie - 28 October 2009 11:45 PM

Party-addicts can’t save the world cause they’re too busy getting high.
The world needs more activists.

it’s funny how some people associate lsd with partying. i associate it with thinking.

Don’t think i’d be too keen to drop LSD at a party. I’d rather walk the natural earth. Rocks & bush any night.

I haven’t even heard the album yet but, I expect it will shift the planet!!!

flavius - 29 October 2009 07:31 AM

Shponzie - 28 October 2009 11:45 PM

Party-addicts can’t save the world cause they’re too busy getting high.
The world needs more activists.

it’s funny how some people associate lsd with partying. i associate it with thinking.

    I agree

Reality check. Testes, testes, 1…2…

section 31 - 29 October 2009 08:14 AM

I haven’t even heard the album yet but, I expect it will shift the planet!!!

at the very least it will shift our planet

Prometheus - 27 October 2009 07:15 PM

i love that the internet so far has no government as such and is essentially anarchic but we are showing our lame need for state control and oppression when we see how we’ve taken the gift of the internet and turned it into a giant theft machine…. if this contnues as it is set to do governments will step in with the excuse of needing to “police ” the internet and we will be left with an internet run by a global internet police force and the greatest to tool for human freedom will be turned into the greatest tool for human repression ever created…..

OK, I’ll try to put an end to this thread. We got so close…all we need is Benji or someone to mention WHO it is that exercised state control and oppression before and would love to do it again…What was the name of that guy with the funny mustache and his political party?