Companion playlist
Why the playlist starts with Kraftwerk.
This is the companion playlist to Euphoria Unleashed, and it runs chronologically through the same history the book tells. It isn't a best of Trance list. Every track is here because it does something the next one builds on, starting with the machines that made this music possible and ending where the genre sits now.
Each era below matches a stretch of the history section of the book, and the resources page has genre maps and radio shows if you want to keep digging past the playlist.
The path
Eight eras, in sequence.
Open an era to see what you're hearing and why it sits where it does. Play it straight through, or use it as background while you read.
The sequencer becomes an instrument. Repetition stops being a limitation and starts being the point. Everything after this borrows from it.
Artists
- Kraftwerk
- Tangerine Dream
- Jean-Michel Jarre
- Giorgio Moroder
Harder machines, colder rooms. This is where the European club floor learned to take a relentless kick for six hours without blinking.
Artists
- Front 242
- Skinny Puppy
- Nitzer Ebb
Frankfurt and the wider European scene start stretching acid house into something longer and more hypnotic. The arrangement becomes the story.
Artists
- Orbital
- The Orb
- The KLF
- Future Sound of London
- Jam & Spoon
The melody moves to the front. Big rooms, big breakdowns and a set of records that still define what most people mean when they say Trance.
Artists
- Paul van Dyk
- Robert Miles
- Cafe Del Mar
- Gouryella
- Cygnus X
Trance goes global and gets booked into arenas. The scale changes the music, and not everyone in the scene is happy about it.
Artists
- Tiesto
- Chicane
- Above & Beyond
- BT
- Rank 1
Tempos settle, arrangements get patient and the sound splits into camps. Uplifting, progressive and psy all pull in different directions.
Artists
- Gareth Emery
- Dash Berlin
- Aly & Fila
- Markus Schulz
Group Therapy turns a radio show into a room full of people who feel like they know each other. Trance becomes a community you belong to.
Artists
- Above & Beyond
- Armin van Buuren
- Anjunabeats
Psytrance crosses over, the classics come back around and a younger crowd finds the sound through festivals rather than record shops.
Artists
- Vini Vici
- Factor B
- Gareth Emery
- Armin van Buuren
- Andrew Bayer
Listen
The full sequence on Spotify.
The playlist is maintained as tracks come and go from streaming. If something in the book isn't in there, it's usually a licensing gap rather than an oversight.