Jikkenteki's TLWH has been spinning intensive around my house lately. And why the hell not? With its' combination of chill and psy there's something for both downs and ups here, and generally I'm well entertained throughout both disc 1 and disc 2.

The chill-out cd exhilerates in long tracks - Warmth In Cold Places clocks in at 15:31 and An Angel Takes Flight at a dazzling 27 minutes+! I'm a big fan of long, epic tracks and this certainly lives up to those criterias. Angel is not quite able to pull of the stunt, though, with a couple of less interesting periods here & there. And that description overall fits the chill-out cd. Most of the way it maintains my curiosity, but sometimes it drags on a little too long. But this comes down to taste, I guess. Cd 1 is a mood setter and as such succeeds pretty good.

But the psy cd2 is my pick of the two. This has some great psychedelic sections with lots of layers and tons of stuff going on. Nice! I've enjoyed this already at home volume levels with a smile, but it's when the headphones comes on this cd comes to its' right. Hell yeah, there are still releases to please fans of melodic psychedelia.

The VERY reasonable price aside this is a double cd that should please most psy fans. Recommended if not groundbreaking revolutionary.

Double home-run!

Jikkenteki is American born/Japan-based producer Rennis Buchner who has been in the game for many years. He’s a founding member of PAR-2 Productions; he’s a raging music collector; a skilled DJ and a very talented producer of both party up-tempo and downbeat music… My first encounter with the works of this very talented producer was on the 2005 compilation A Walk Through Neptune’s Garden. That compilation and this debut album are both released on his own PAR-2 Productions label… The first release was an overlooked gem which I really, really enjoyed – and I’ve been looking forward to this double album ever since it was released… Let’s take a walk…

Releasing a double album as your debut, might seem pretty adventurous and indeed brave in these trouble mp3-times, but Jikkenteki pulled it off – this is a VERY fine release! Some of these tracks have been years in the making, and that fact does not go by unnoticed... This is extremely well-produced, highly nurtured, detail rich, multi-flavoured music. Without being over-produced mind you! Both CDs are excellent, but the killaaaargh-factor is slightly higher on the first downbeat CD... I mean, just check out the two longest tracks – they are in a league of their own! Awesome stuff!

The second dancefloor CD also has a high concentration of stand-out tracks... A couple of the more experimental tunes don’t amaze me as much as the rest, but it’s not like they are bad... There is no bad music here at all – on the contrary, the quality level is impressive! And those stand-out tracks are absolutely gorgeous! Top drawer material for sure! It’s also impressive to observe just how wide-spanning those tracks are musically... This is a record store clerk’s nightmare... It’s gonna be impossible to file under a certain sub-genre! But Jikkenteki doesn’t give a fuck about puny details like that... He just wants to share his musical vision with the world... And what a vision that is!

The cover art is pretty nice too – without being overly impressive! The real gem though, is the informative booklet that holds interesting information on all tracks and so on... All in all, a very nice package – and best of all, it’s available directly from the PAR-2 website for only $13 including worldwide shipping! Now that’s the best damn bargain I’ve heard for a while! A safe purchase for fans of eclectic, psychedelic downbeat and versatile, up-tempo psytrance... Enjoy!

Favourites:
CD1: 3(!!), 5(!!)
CD2: 1, 2, 6(!), 7(!!), 8(!)