Present Day, Present Time

Some things never change, in the midst of arranging things for the 10 year anniversary for ilictronix, behind the scenes I've spent after spending the better part of a month back-and-forthing over a copyright issue. I've been planning to put this up for a while anyway, but this just gave me an even better reason to. Besides, it's been ages since I used this Soundcloud account for anything anyway.

Yes we weren't the only ones celebrating recently: super surreal psychological cyberpunk series Serial Experiments Lain also turned 20 this year. One of the contributors to the soundtrack Wasei Chikada celebrated in kind by releasing a sequel to the soundtrack to the fictional Club Cyberia, fittingly called Cyberia Layer_2. The original album Cyberia Mix has been a favourite of mine since I went down a Japanese techno/trance hole a few years ago so naturally I snatched the sequel up ASAP. I was actually going to review the album, but I didn't feel comfortable doing it when it wasn't on any streaming services for me to embed, and it's since fallen by the wayside.



Thankfully though, as a bonus for picking up the LP in physical format, Wasei hooked me up with a promo EP that consists of his rework of ScummV's bootleg remix of Bôa's Duvet (which is brilliant) and the actual live mix he did at the Serial Experiments Lain 20th party. The mix itself is mostly made up of tunes from Cyberia Layer_2 as you might expect from the title, and as such it's a pretty fantastic summary of the album, it's a real mixed bag of genres as the first Cyberia Mix was, dancing effortlessly between Electro, Techno, and House; it even gets a little synth/vaporwavy at one point which is actually very fitting given the source material. Some of the tunes from the original Cyberia Mix also make an appearance to boot, which is a nice touch. There are a couple of hip/trip hop tracks from Layer_2 that I'd have liked to make an appearance, but it's a real solid mix regardless, the appearance of Prototype K towards the end absolutely side swiped me, it's one of my favourite ambient pieces and it's put to downright sublime use here. I've transcribed a tracklist below! all tunes are by Wasei himself unless otherwise stated, and all songs are from Cyberia Layer_2 other than Antidepressant 044, Professed Intention And Real Intention and Prototype K.

Tracklist:
Antidepressant 044
Accela (Original Mix)
Accela (Ko Kimura Remix)
"s"peEd (JJ's Rework)
Got THe Mic
Hideo Kobayashi - Navi 3.0
Cloudy, With Occasional Rain (JJ's Rework)
Kuroshio (Thousand Knives Mix)
Professed Intention And Real Intention
"s"peEd (Q'hey Remix)
Antidepressant 044
Akira Takemoto - Prototype K
Sarasvati


It's been a long time since I've had a live mix added to my collection, I think the last ones I added were a bunch of Ed Banger crew bootlegs around about 2009 or so. it's been pretty nice actually, it's certainly made the commute more interesting that's for sure. Serial Experiments Lain means a lot to me; both the soundtracks and the series itself so I was very happy to see it's 20th anniversary celebrated by so many people, both fans and those involved in both the audio and visual side of things! Enjoy, and I'll see you all next week.

プレゼント • デイ
プレゼント • タイム
-Claude Van Foxbat