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-- Anyone here make tribal trance? What exactly makes a track "tribal"?
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Anyone here make tribal trance? What exactly makes a track "tribal"?

I kinda just realized today that I'm sick of most melodic trance. Not sick as in done producing it for good, but sick as in most of it just sounds too neurotic and cheesy sounding for my taste. I mean I love the music, but I feel myself being pulled towards more tribal sounding type music.

I don't really know a lot of tribal music except for what I can find on youtube. And I should prob mention I've had an obsession with MANY of Tony Morans remixes, well really just his intros. I know they are simple, but they have a very "primal" sound to them. Is this intro considered tribal?

Tony Moran Link 1

Mainly from 0 - 1:13, I kinda lose interest once the vocals come in. But is that a basic tribal beat?

I can't really find the exact sound I'm going for. I want less synths and more toms, more percs, more drums and more groove, less speed, off beat basses, congos, cans, etc etc. Thats pretty much my idea of what tribal is. In regular trance sometimes you get cool drum intros, but once the leads come in the groove can become neurotic and too speedy which often distracts me with all the different elements being played. I wanna focus on having every drum element being part of a single groove, not a million different things happening at once.

Does anyone here know any tribal music that I can use as a reference? Any "classics" maybe? It doesn't seem like a popular genre because a lot of tracks I'm finding on youtube are amateur. Is there any good artists that do strictly tribal tracks? I'm trying to learn how to make it basically.

2003 Tribalmaster1 by Mad For Brad

my only tribal attempt but it is still quite trancy. I think it is mostly just the rhythm that gives it a quality you would describe as tribal.

Here is an old classic tribalish trance collab between Humate and Rabbit In The Moon:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_QGrgTotpw&fmt=18

You're right that it's not all that popular, certainly not as much as tribal house. I think it used to be a bit more popular to have "tribal" sounds like congas and stuff in trance, back in the early to mid '90s. After that things kind of sped up and veered in the direction of less in your face percs, in favor of bigger synth leads.

Robby, you are approaching the coming of age milestone that affects most EDM enthusiasts;

It starts with wanting just some tribal elements in your trance and ends with you listening to deep house, while wearing a smoking jacket.

Seriously though, I had this same feeling nearly 10 years ago and I think you'll find yourself looking at different forms of EDM...but if you can bring those elements back in to trance then you can make something very interesting.....

Is there such thing as 'tribal-trance'?

Anyways, this is an example of what I call 'tribal-tech house':

Nick Cenik - 1 42am (Original Mix) [INCORRECT MUSIC]

Two of the most common characteristics of tribal seem to be the presence of (reliance on) 1) numerous drum grooves (toms, congas, etc.) and 2) African/Latin/Spanish/etc. vocals.

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Originally posted by DJ RANN Robby, you are approaching the coming of age milestone that affects most EDM enthusiasts; It starts with wanting just some tribal elements in your trance and ends with you listening to deep house, while wearing a smoking jacket.

LOL!

This board does have a big smoking jacket contingent. Just read Music Discussion sometime.

drums......extensive use of toms in particular will give a "tribal" feel - they need to be the focus instead of your brass hi hats and cymbals

I used this track to successfully decimate several dance floors back in the day. One of the best examples of "tribal", IMO.

by decimated , do you mean they all left ? That was so fucking bland with absolutely no groove. I might buy that some were dancing buy decimated ? Jesus. Must of been some good drugs going around to make that even danceable.

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Originally posted by Mad for Brad by decimated , do you mean they all left ?

Of course not.

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Originally posted by Mad for Brad That was so fucking bland with absolutely no groove. I might buy that some were dancing buy decimated ?

"dancing buy decimated" What does this statement mean?

Anyway, it sure worked on the dance floor, in several instances.

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Originally posted by Mad for Brad Jesus. Must of been some good drugs going around to make that even danceable.

Maybe, but it worked. I guess you just had to be there.

I've seen people dancing to no music at raves so who fucking knows. I just don't see how anyone would find that song particularly good let alone stand out.

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Originally posted by Mad for Brad I've seen people dancing to no music at raves so who fucking knows. I just don't see how anyone would find that song particularly good let alone stand out.

Doesn't really translate properly when you are sitting on a room listening on YouTube, gotta hear it on a big system. Sasha dropped this back then and it blew the roof off the place. The dance floor is a very different place.

Like take Jark Prongo's Moving Thru Your System. Doesn't sund particularly great over YouTube sitting in a room, but hear it on a club system at 2am and it kills. That's why DJing experience is so important when you are producing club tracks, it helps you to understand what works on a dance floor.

I was a dj. I can easily hear something and understand how it will translate to the dance floor. I've seen hundreds of djs make people dance only because the people were all really fucking high.

Get them high enough and they will even dance to Stars of the Lid:

Tribal, imo.



I suppose I would say tribal is a lot like darkpsy, just without really fast rolling basslines/squelchy synth sounds/crying children/screams of death/etc. After you get rid of that stuff, throw in some really repetitive but natural sounding percussion and middle-eastern/Indian vocal samples. Native American sounding stuff works really well too, especially with tambourines.

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Originally posted by DJ RANN It starts with wanting just some tribal elements in your trance and ends with you listening to deep house, while wearing a smoking jacket.

Holy shit. You just described me exactly.

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Originally posted by Nick Cenik Is there such thing as 'tribal-trance'? Anyways, this is an example of what I call 'tribal-tech house': Nick Cenik - 1 42am (Original Mix) [INCORRECT MUSIC]

Thats a pretty technically proficient track. Rare to hear tech house of that quality on here.

Tribal is all about polyrhythms, ethnic vocals, short loops and percussion layers.

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Originally posted by kitphillips Thats a pretty technically proficient track. Rare to hear tech house of that quality on here.

Thanks a lot Kit!! A friend recently shared some tips/tricks with me so I've been able to really step up the quality of my productions. Plus I spent a lot of time trying to get 1:42am sounding as best as possible

(Shameless promotion: ) Beatport link for the tune is in my sig ...

I know what you mean DJ Robby Rox, you're after a more intelligent beat/percussion element and adding tribal elements this can definatley help a beat.

I like Nicks track, if you put together tech house/techno and a touch of funky you will probably find what you are after and these tracks will have more energy than just listening to one of those single genres, Wally Lopez and Joris Voorn mix this style in most of their sets, Joris is more techno though.

Check it out a good WL set below.

[[ LINK REMOVED ]]


I'm exploring mixing a trancier element in to this style which will probably mean adding some bigger synths but keeping to the more is less methodology.

Actually I just made a post on how to create these types of beats so join in on that thread if you like.

/re-lights cigar, adjusts smoking jacket

Robby - this guy is the king of stripped back tribal - his toms are the tightest ever - I've been trying to get toms like this for a year - not easy at all.

He's in SanFransico.

I don't think you can go straight from tribal tech house and mix it with trance. You have to work more from the basis of Dub techno IMO, like basic channel style shit, and push those rhythms back into trance.

Of course, you'll have to drop the supersaws and stuff and work a lot more syncopation into the plucks to make it sound convincing, but you'll probably get there eventually.

Trying to fuse tech house and trance is like trying to make a blackish shade of white, they're completely opposed. Tech house is all about the funk, a sort of "I don't give a fuck" attitude. Its a really off the cuff, emotionless style, perfect for sitting around having a few drinks with your friends. Trance (should be) about getting lost in the music, caught between the layers of pads and basses. Its much more emotional and sounds like it takes itself seriously and cares. Which is why it works better with dub techno IMO.

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Trying to fuse tech house and trance is like trying to make a blackish shade of white, they're completely opposed. Tech house is all about the funk, a sort of "I don't give a fuck" attitude. Its a really off the cuff, emotionless style, perfect for sitting around having a few drinks with your friends. Trance (should be) about getting lost in the music, caught between the layers of pads and basses. Its much more emotional and sounds like it takes itself seriously and cares. Which is why it works better with dub techno IMO.

Good explanation Out of curiosity, how would you differentiate Tribal Tech House and standard Tech House using the aforementioned terminology?

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Originally posted by LoWahn Good explanation Out of curiosity, how would you differentiate Tribal Tech House and standard Tech House using the aforementioned terminology?

Well, I think you could take the tribal elements from tribal tech house and put them into a trance context, but I don't think you could take the tech house elements. So what I was saying, was that if you wanted to take tribal elements from somewhere, you'd be better off taking them from more dub techno sounds, rather than from tech house sounds. Thought I should clarify that.

Tribal tech house is like this


This is more the tribal sound used in dub techno occasionally (although not all dub techno is tribal influenced)


So the obvious differences are that dub techno is a bit more emotive to me, its a bit more serious, its a bit more inclined to get you lost. Tribal tech house is a bit more off the cuff, it doesn't really care what anyone thinks of it as much, but its got some bursts of emotion. Overall, its a flatter genre, it doesn't try to take you on a journey or really engage you emotionally. Dub techno is more inclined to do those things.

Bear in mind that I'm not saying that tech house is bad for not taking itself seriously or being emotive, that sort of vibe definately has its place.

Its worth considering when you're making this stuff that tech house is about 15 BPM slower than trance on average, which gives the grooves more room to swing. To do this in trance, you need some strong polyrhythmic grooves going on, and maybe to drop the BPM down to something closer to prog (127-134 or so).

I love this Track, It's like 3 Tracks in 1!

couple of my all time favorite tracks, got them on vinyl too. i call them tribal because they make my adrenaline pump like im gonna fight a lion in africa or something but im not sure of the definition of tribal lol.

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Originally posted by MrJiveBoJingles Get them high enough and they will even dance to Stars of the Lid:

At 1:30 I was almost expecting that tellytubbie baby to appear....

Man I wish I was high right now.

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