Transylvania Calling :: Psytrance Festival

Transylvania Calling is an alternative lifestyle, music and arts festival that goes on for seven days, every two years, in Romania. It's one of those festivals I'd love to go to one day. People from all over the world gather there for the amazingly-beautiful-nature-artistic-wonderland experience and to connect with other likeminded folk. They have a lot of focus on workshops about healing, growth, wellbeing, nurturing and communicating. Here are some photos from last August's festival taken by French photographer Come Callais who gave me an elven permission to post these glimpses of Transylvania here for all to see :)

Yes, the fairy in the third to last photo is Oona whom we already know. I'm going to a psytrance party myself tonight in Brooklyn, NY and am very excited! Perhaps I'll take a couple of photos too. It's been too long since the last time I got to dance all night long. I even skipped hooping last night so I will have maximum energy tonight. And only hooped lightly the night before. Straight-edge raving is a delicate science that requires careful planning. Or gets to be that way as the body gets older, anyways :P Have a splendid weekend everyone!

Cute, Creepy and Psychedelic Art by Mark Ryden

A long time ago I saw a painting by Mark Ryden that just stuck to my brain. His art is really peculiar. It looks like pop art, or something attractive and easy for the eye to look at, but then on a closer look, you see all the creepy and bizarre details. He combines religious symbols, fluffy pets and toys, children and flowers with slabs of meat and pictures of the devil.

His paintings are quite challenging. They make me stop and think about the society we're living in. It's actually true: the dead flesh of animals is neatly sold at supermarkets right next to aisles full of cute, cuddly toys for kids. Little children are fed blood and meat - products of ghastly violence - on spoons that have Disney princesses on them. We hang religious pictures on our wall or wear meditation beads around our neck yet never think of God. Things may look all clean and pink and smily in our western world yet there is a price for everything, price that we don't want to pay or think of. Well I could go on and on about how his art affects me.

I'm curious, what thoughts went through your mind when looking at these paintings?

Remembering the Finnish Psytrance Scene

Something extraordinary is happening tonight. I'm going to a psytrance party in the USA. At one point in my life I used to go to psy parties every weekend, sometimes a few times a week. (FYI, they're raves where the dj's play psychedelic trance which is quite a specific category of electronic music.) Obviously, this wasn't in the USA but in Finland where the scene is very much ALiVe and kiKkiNg.

There is even a category of psytrance called suomisaundi, or suomi. It's Finnish and simply translates to "Finland Sound". For more info on it check the Wiki on it. For a heartwarming experience of it, listen to this track from 2003 (I think?) by Aavepyörä. It's a remix of the cartoon Tao Tao theme song. I listened to it like eight times yesterday and a couple of times today, just love how kooky it is.

In the summer the suomi heads have tons of forest parties in various secret locations, decorated with UV art and tapestries. I remember going to these a lot and dancing all night, and the next day. Sometimes the police would find out and come stop the party. I don't think the parties were really stopped too often, just relocated :)

Finnish psytrancers keep dancing, in the forest, in the morning:

...and in the forest, late at night:

In the summer they take over the park and dance:

...and in the winter they take over the park and dance:

They take over the main streets in busy Helsinki downtown and dance:



I guess this last video really sums it up and shows you some beautiful Finnish nature as well.

I'll finish off my reminiscing with a pic of myself in a Finnish UG psy party about a year ago :) Happy weekend everyone!

Sue the Doctor, Things Got Trippy!

Just another psychedelic afternoon in North Carolina... I had an absolute blast hooping with the two of me. The music: clip from Sue the Doctor by Tim Duster, and the main song is Avaruusmetro [Space Subway] by EvsY, these are some of my favorite Finnish psytrance artists.