Subject: Techno music "attack" on shamanism/ecstatic experience
Date: 28 Oct 1995 00:44:16 GMT

I've been listening (involuntarily) to my brother's techno music. I always have a bad reaction to it, and my gut feel is that it is an attack on shamanic experience. It feels to me to be a desecration and trivialisation of sacred drumming and the feelings associated with it.

From: jec4@Ra.MsState.Edu (Joseph E. Ckarke)

No no no, I dont think the serious artists would do that. I mean, I could be wrong, but I think a lot of inspiration is aquired through shamanic culture, and ritual. I mean look at the projects that are in harmony with the shamanic drumming and ritual: Deep forest. Intermixes:future primitives. Aphex twin. Talor808s works like human mesh dance, and youve got to admit that many of his acid beats are the most blunt, digital, and forward(and backwards). Even thing like amorphous endrogenous has the most CRUSHing effect, but the fact that shamanic concioussness lies within cannot be denied. So maybe we can deduce from this, that the act of grooving, stomping, and flying is a shamanic element in itself. Not an attack. The shamans listen from everything to static to ambient to tribal to acid to anything. No one would attack them; any attempt would be naive, futile, and certainly vulgar. Shamanism is part of spirit; unspirited music doesnt do well, doesnt get played often(not here in utopia anyway). Maybe too much paranoia has plagued our streets.

Subject: Re: Techno music "attack" on shamanism/ecstatic experience
From: vivek@cs.rice.edu (Vivek Sadananda Pai)

While I'm not sure how it relates to Shamanism, there is definitely some really good religious or religion-inspired techno music. I think it would be fair to say that I attempt to be religious, and I've definitely found a good deal of techno music that I don't find contrary to religion at all.

There are, of course, some branches of techno that focus really heavily on sex and drugs, and that's not my thing, but there are other examples:

Moby - very famous techno guy, straightedge Christian, I think
Ian Ion (Overlord) - just put out a CD with a Hare Krishna monk (sanyasi)
William Orbit - Strange Cargo III CD had images, etc., from Angkor Wat, the largest temple complex in the world

I'm sure others can name other artists.

-Vivek

From: Crow <mw25@york.ac.uk>

For the most part Techno music is just about dancing and having a good time - which is fine. I don't think there is any intentional shamanic `desecration' involved. What annoys me about it is all the pretentious nonsense these techno musicians spout about spirituality, shamanism and parapsychology which are clearly things they niether know nor care anything about. If they want to discover more about their spiritual nature then they should get on with it. If they just want to have a good time then they should get on with that and stop pretending that sticking three notes in a sequencer and twiddling the tone switch is a deep and meaningful experience.
--
Martin Wilson, University of York, UK

From: makyrag@dircon.co.uk (Nemesis)
Date: Mon, 30 Oct 1995 02:38:44 +0000

While all the above may be true, I think you guys have either missed the point or maybe just not heard the right music. A large amount of techno, especially psychedelic dance is geared to enable the listener and dancer to achieve a raised state of awareness, and I don't mean by taking drugs(although for some this helps), while experiencing the music.

For some it is enough to use a techno party as a release and to gain a sense of well being while others will treat each party like a religous experiance, using the spiralling energies of the music to raise their conciousness, much like many shamanistic beliefs use drumming etc. For these people, this is their 'religion'. It is certainly not an attempt to attack or rip off other beliefs. A positivity exists at these parties that exists in few other places in our society and this can't be bad!

Take it easy ----- Nemesis

From: edlantz@aol.com (Edlantz)
Subject: Re: Techno music "attack" on shamanism/ecstatic experience
Date: 27 Nov 1995 20:27:58 -0500

Techno/Tribal/Trance etc. is the closest thing to a tribal shamanistic experience that most young people have access to. Any shamanistic musician would be well advised to exploit the techno club scene as a contact point with today's youth. Visuals, drumming, chanting, psychodelics, etc. are all a part of today's techno scene. The young need guidance, not condemnation!

edlantz@aol.com