Universal Techno

The history of trance music between Goa and Tel Aviv. During their annual leave, young active duty Israeli soldiers discover the path to a new techno music genre: Goa trance is born.

This comprehensive documentary chronicles the underground rave culture in Southern California, one of its first American strongholds. With roots in a tribal past, this movement attempts to format the future of a truly global community by combining elements of electronic/percussive music, the psychedelic imagination, and mass dancing. From warehouses to mountain retreats to the deserts of the Mojave, an unseen world comes into clear focus; with kinetic camera work and candid interviews, this slice of visual anthropology probes the underbelly of a worldwide subculture with the help of some of electronic music's most acclaimed DJs, a technomusicologist, and a county sheriff. Open your mind to this moving entertainment experience and intimate portrait of a modern counter-culture that follows its own electronically induced beat.

A documentary that explores the challenges that a life in music can bring.

In an apartment, a party is in full swing. Sitting on a sofa, Perez is hypnotized by a group of four girls facing him.

"At the beginning of the 19th century there is no Chicago. There was a fort that was set on fire by Indians shortly thereafter. Later, the turbulent expansion of a settlement began, which became a center for the immigrant workforce, traditional industry, slaughterhouses, and, in 1941, armaments for war. The Windy City on Lake Michigan is the fastest changing city in the world. This 35mm Arriflex film time-lapse footage is annotated with classic techno cuts and information about the tunnels under Chicago, the slaughterhouses, organized crime, Sears & Roebuck catalogs and other peculiarities of this strange city."

When Adam's job is threatened, he seeks distraction at a rave.

Japanese cyber youth cultures have developed through the imaginative and novel use of technology. Underlying social, cultural and economic trends are examined such as Japan's unique, isolated island culture, the post-economic boom recession and changing attitudes towards the role of the corporation in work and career attitudes.

This lost classic, shot on 16mm in a wintry Berlin in 1993, explores the origins of the German trance scene. Featuring interviews with fresh-faced selectors including Laurent Garnier and MFS Records founder Mark Reeder, the documentary also feature footage from the city's iconic Love Parades in 1991 and 1993.

The Metalheadz Documentary is an intimate and immediate account of a Drum & Bass label poised for world domination. DJs and producers talk openly of the artistic freedom they enjoy, how the label has evolved to represent such a diverse musical scene and why moving forward and pushing the boundaries is so vital. These names have created a global phenomenon and here talk for the first time of how it was achieved, where it's at and what the future holds.

It was 1906. "Get Music on Tap Like Gas or Water" promised the headlines, and soon the public was enchanted with inventor Thaddeus Cahill's (1867-1934) electrical music by wire. The Telharmonium was a 200-ton behemoth that created numerous musical timbres and could flood many rooms with sound. Beginning with the first instrument, constructed in the 1890's, and continuing with the installation of the second instrument at Telharmonic Hall in New York, the rise and fall of commercial service, the attempted comeback of the third Telharmonium, and ending with efforts to find a home for the only surviving instrument in 1951, this documentary provides a definitive account of the first comprehensive music synthesizer.

'Looking for the Perfect Beat' is a cinema verite immersion inside the unique Los Angeles 'beat-scene' music community centered around the world famous Low End Theory club night. Filmed over the Summer of 2013, a climatic point in this particular music scene's trajectory, we are given the opportunity to elegantly lift the veil on the personal creative processes of the internationally-acclaimed pillars of the scene. Indie music luminaries such as Flying Lotus, Thundercat, Gaslamp Killer, Daedelus, Nosaj Thing, Ras G, Teebs, D-Styles, TOKiMONSTA and Matthewdavid are all featured in vivid detail. The soundtrack for the film creates itself live on camera as the film elapses. This avant-garde visual angle on each subject in their respective creative spaces provides for an introspective glimpse into what would otherwise be unseen.

A man tours clubs around the globe with his manager and girlfriend. On the eve of their largest album release he is admitted to a psychiatric clinic after overdosing at a gig.

Dance music has spread across the world transcending religious & racial barriers connecting to the hearts and souls of millions. People have always felt the rhythm of music and have as a result evolved countless dance styles throughout the ages. Beginning in the late 80's in Melbourne's underground dance music party scene, a revolutionary freestyle dance began to grow and has now developed into the most unique and robust underground dance style since the birth of Breakdancing. The Melbourne Shuffle has no set steps but encourages individuality and imagination, incorporating dance moves from numerous styles such as miming, popping & locking, liquid and breaking.

Erasure--Hits: The Videos plays in Dolby stereo, with some of the later videos being 16:9 format. Disc 2 includes exclusive performance footage, rare videos and tracks performed live on all of Erasure's major tours. Six lengthy promotional documentaries from 2001 to 2003 are included, which feature interviews with the pair. Hidden bonus footage has also been crammed on to the disc. The only downside is the clumsy menus, which are difficult to navigate and are not all that pleasing to the eye. --John Galilee

Witness the artist at work as legendary Detroit techno pioneer Jeff Mills creates a live DJ mix with astonishing, hypnotic dexterity.

An explosion in the underground music scene is met by massive investment into Tucson, Arizona. Documentarian, Ty Besh, followed the scene from 2016 to 2018 showing the vast changes that happened to the people, venues, and scene in just 2 years. This Documentary serves as an archive and also a reminder to everyone in the DIY scenes across the world that moments come and go.

An unnamed passer-by is forced to trace a circular route inside an abandoned tram station, facing loss and time. The broken walls act as a channel, transmitting fragmentary, blurred and analogical memories. 

Since 2013, the Casual Gabberz collective has been storming dancefloors and the stages of the biggest festivals with its gabber surge, that hardcore techno sound born in Holland in the 90s. Until a virus causes the planet to go haywire. And triggered an existential crisis within the collective.

In the final days of the yuppie decade, the summer of ’89 saw a new type of youth rebellion rip through the cultural landscape, with thousands of young people dancing at illegal Acid House parties in fields and aircraft hangars around the M25. Set against the backdrop of ten years of Thatcherism, it was a benign form of revolution, dubbed the Second Summer of Love – all the ravers wanted was the freedom to party… The rave scene, along with the drug Ecstasy, broke down social barriers and even football hooligans were ‘loved up’, solving a problem the government had never managed to crack. But lurid tabloid headlines and cat-and-mouse games with the police eventually turned the dream sour, as the gangster element moved in at the end of the summer.

Back in February of 2005, Massive Attack and Portishead shared the stage for the first time ever whilst preforming live as a part of the fund raising concert for the Tsunami Crisis in Asia @ the Bristol Academy.