Every time I get a new audio file, no matter its source, it needs to go through a process to be admitted on the phone and the hard drive backup; that process mostly includes opening it up in Audacity, making sure that there aren't long silent tails or intros to be cut off, make sure that I clean up pops and hiss as best I can (hiss is easier to remove than clicks and pops) and if it's not mastered at the same level (more or less) as the rest of my collection, use the Amplify tool to fix that (I very rarely lower volume, although it's not completely unheard of. Older music is often mastered at a lower level than newer music, though, so I often raise the volume level of the track.) Once I've gone through this process, the song is added to my microSD card, and is put into circulation. As part of that processing, I also listen to the song at least once more all the way through, and if it meets my subjective criteria to be added to the best of list, it is—at which point, a copy is archived on a thumb drive, and it's added to the spreadsheet that has all the tracks that are on the 700 or so track best of list. Again, this isn't exclusively hardtrance (although I mostly call it a hardtrance list); some trance-like early hardstyle is mixed in there, a few other classic or progressive trance songs that may not be hard per se, but which are close enough in style and which I like, a fair bit of acid (some of it is acid trance, but some of it is just acid house or acid techno. I don't really think distinguishing between them is entirely possible, to be honest with you.) And here and there, there's just another EDM song that is close enough in style that I added it too, even if it's something else entirely.
I do have more EDM on my phone, of course, and I'm deliberately excluding songs that I like as much as I like anything on this list, but which don't really fit the setlists (if this were some gigantic set) well enough because the style or genre is too different. For instance, other than trance-like early hardstyle, none of my hardstyle songs are considered. None of my EBM or synthpop songs get the nod, none of my synthwave or dreamwave songs are considered, etc.
Anyway, here's the original tracklist again, now re-christened as Hardtrance megamix 01. I've got 20 more tracks to go through processing (at least two of which I know for sure won't be added to the list because they're the wrong genre of music. Another one is a repeat of another track I already have, although the artist name is updated. Nightclub - "French Kiss [DJ Scot Project Remix]" and Yakooza - "French Kiss [Scot Project Remix]" are the same song, but it was re-released under the newer band name. (I'll still review it, because I suspect that the Yakooza version is a better version from an audio quality standpoint.) I'm sure several others won't make the cut either, so I've really only got about 10-12 or so more tracks to put into circulation. Because of that, I felt confident in going ahead and sorting a second megamix tracklist, shown below the tracklist for the original.
I also highlighted "My Name Is Acid" because I actually took that song out of my list, even though I'd already mixed it into the megamix track before I decided to do that.
Hardtrance megamix 01
- Arome - Here We Go [Midnight Mix]
- Underworld - Cowgirl [Tim Davison Remix]
- DuMonde - Never Look Back [Tiesto Full On Vocal]
- Jimmy the Sound - M.O.D.U.L.O. [One Vrs Edit]
- Kai Tracid - Trance & Acid [Derb Remix]
- The Juvenile - Hardcore Suckas [Trance Generators Mix]
- Blank & Jones - DJs, Fans, and Freaks (D.F.F.)
- Avatar - Red Planet [DJ Wag Remix]
- Immersion - My Name Is Acid
- A*S*Y*S - Monster 303
- High Voltage - Bombs Away
- DJ Wag - Life On Mars [DJ Wag Mix]
Hardtrance megamix 02
- Phuture Punk - Der Klang [Junk Project Mix]
- Tommy Pulse - The Answer [Danny V Remix]
- A*S*Y*S - No More Fucking Rock and Roll
- Pro-Tech - Free Your Mind [Y.O.M.C. Club Mix]
- Hennes & Cold - Can't Have Enough [Remix]
- Cosmic Commando - Heartbreak [DJ Vortex & Arpa's Dream Remix]
- Arome - Talk II Me [Talking Mix]
- Warp Brothers - Blade [Original Club Mix]
- Kai Tracid - Tiefenrausch [NRG Mix]
- Mr. Gasmask - Primordial Soup [Original Mix]
- System F - Out of the Blue [Original 12" Version]
- K-Traxx - Noise Tool
My original sorting had two versions of Tommy Pulse's "The Answer" so I obviously couldn't use them both without it being a little silly. It also had two A*S*Y*S songs. I could have worked with that, but I decided to skip the second one that came up and pick one more up from just below the list of 12.
Most of these songs actually are regular old hardtrance songs. A*S*Y*S is, as you'd expect, riddled with acid. The Warp Brothers track samples the classic acid riff from New Order's "Confusion [Pump Panel Reconstruction]" and sounds a bit more like a hard house song otherwise, sometimes. Mr. Gasmask provides acid techno, System F's song is a classic trance classic (although I do have hardtrance remixes of it, and even hardstyle remixes of it too), and K-Traxx, unexpectedly, delivers a song that straddles the line between hardtrance and hardstyle.
Altogether, I get more hardtrance than the last megamix, which had more "other" than I would have expected. Just based on odds because of what's in my collection, I expect at least two or three tracks from the following artists: A*S*Y*S, Tommy Pulse, Cosmic Gate, DJ Wag (or one of his many collaborations and aliases), Hennes & Cold and/or Derb, Arome and/or Scot Project and Kai Tracid. Got about what I expected there; a Tommy Pulse, an A*SY*S, a Hennes & Cold, an Arome, a DJ Wag song (Pro-Tech) and a Kai Tracid. In fact, I got more than I expected, especially considering that I deliberately took out both another A*S*Y*S and Tommy Pulse song that the randomization actually wanted me to use. I also expect at least one acid techno song and one song that's "other"—early hardstyle, or classic trance, or something else. Got all of those too—an acid techno song, a classic trance song, and an early hardstyle song. Curiously, I got all of them in order so that the set will end on those three songs too.
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