News / trance
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1 min read
Tayo Ricci - WORLD CUP
Read more . . . →Second Elysian pick because the label earned it and WORLD CUP is ridiculous in the way I want trance to be ridiculous. The title is dumb and the track absolutely backs it up with a main riff that sounds like a stadium full of people who all lost their minds at once. Tayo Ricci builds the energy with zero patience, which is usually a complaint but here it’s the entire appeal. You get maybe thirty seconds before it’s already trying to peel your face off. The kick pattern is relentless and the synth stabs are tuned to that perfect uncomfortable...
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SUPERSTRINGS - NEON DUSK PROTOCOL
Read more . . . →A track called “NEON DUSK PROTOCOL” in all caps is making promises, and SUPERSTRINGS mostly keeps them. This is full-fat trance, the kind with a soaring lead that aims straight for the back of an arena and a breakdown built to make 10,000 people put their hands up at once. We’ve been light on trance lately, which is a shame, because when it hits right there’s nothing else quite like that euphoric rush. The build here is textbook in the best sense, tension stacked patiently until the release feels earned rather than cheap. SUPERSTRINGS clearly grew up on the Armada...
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Darren Styles feat. MERYLL - Miss You
Darren Styles is hard dance royalty and this one with MERYLL hits like nostalgia weaponized. You already know what it does.Read more . . . →Subscribe →Weekly digestWhat you missed this week, minus the corporate emo. -
1 min read
ANDROMEDA - NO PROMENADA
Read more . . . →Trance has been quietly having a moment again and tracks like NO PROMENADA are why. ANDROMEDA isn’t going for the misty-eyed Anjuna thing here. This is harder, faster, built for a dark room at 3am rather than a sunrise set. The lead synth is a laser pointed directly at the part of your brain that responds to repetition, and the track just keeps hammering that one idea until repetition becomes the whole point. There’s almost no melody in the traditional sense, which is exactly why it works. It’s hypnosis disguised as a club track. The breakdown strips everything back to...
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Paul Oakenfold x Markus Schulz x Grace - Not Over Yet
Read more . . . →Two trance institutions in one credit line. Paul Oakenfold basically helped invent the modern superstar DJ template, and Markus Schulz has been holding the global club night sound together for twenty-plus years, so a collab on “Not Over Yet” reads like a summit meeting. The Grace vocal is the giveaway about where this is aimed, pulling from that classic late-90s trance vocal lineage that still gives goosebumps to anyone who was there. It’s nostalgic without feeling like a tribute band. The production is widescreen and polished, the kind of mix that sounds enormous on a festival rig and still works...
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1 min read
Kiholm & LEA KEY - Take Me Back
Read more . . . →Kiholm teaming up with LEA KEY on “Take Me Back” lands right in that sweet, nostalgic pocket of melodic dance music that pulls at something without being manipulative about it. The vocal is wistful and warm, a plea for return that the production wraps in shimmering synths and a steady, propulsive beat. There’s a real sense of yearning baked into the whole arrangement, the kind that makes a packed room go quiet for a second before the drop sends everyone moving again. Kiholm has a deft touch with these emotional builds, never rushing the payoff. The melody is the star...
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SUPERSTRINGS - NEON DUSK PROTOCOL (Live at EDC Las Vegas 2026)
Read more . . . →Second EDC 2026 clip in the queue and SUPERSTRINGS went a darker, more cinematic route than Ship Wreck. “NEON DUSK PROTOCOL” sounds exactly like its ridiculous name, in the best possible way, all sci-fi tension and arpeggios that feel like a synthwave movie chase scene scored for 40,000 sweaty people. The all-caps title had me bracing for cheese and instead I got genuinely menacing trance with teeth. The breakdown around the midpoint strips everything back to a single pulsing line before the whole machine roars back to life, and the crowd reaction on the clip says it landed in person....
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Ship Wreck - The Function (Live at EDC Las Vegas 2026)
Read more . . . →EDC Las Vegas 2026 footage is starting to leak out and Ship Wreck’s set is the first one worth your time. “The Function” played live in front of a desert crowd that size hits completely different than it would in your kitchen, and even through a phone camera and YouTube compression you can feel the floor moving. This is big-room trance built for exactly this moment: hands up, lasers everywhere, 40,000 people pretending they’re not exhausted at 3am. The build is patient and almost cruel about how long it makes you wait, then the release actually justifies it, which is...
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Eynka feat. Låpsley - Promises
Read more . . . →Låpsley’s voice does something specific to electronic music — it cools it down by a few degrees in a way that makes the warm parts hit harder by contrast. Eynka have clearly understood this and built an entire track around it. Promises is melodic trance but it doesn’t push into the overwrought territory a lot of melodic trance tends toward. The restraint is what makes it. There’s a sense of longing running through the whole track that the production matches without overselling it. Armada puts out a lot of music and a lot of it blurs together, but this one...
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Eelke Kleijn - Tonco Liveset (Armada Invites)
Read more . . . →Sometimes you don’t want a three-minute hit, you want to disappear into a full set, and Eelke Kleijn’s Armada Invites session at Tonco is built for exactly that. This is melodic, progressive, deeply-patient house and trance from a guy who has been doing it long enough to have nothing left to prove. The setting helps: gorgeous location, golden-hour light, the kind of crowd that came to listen rather than film. Kleijn reads a room better than almost anyone, layering tracks so smoothly you stop noticing the transitions and just let the thing carry you. Put this on while you work,...
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