Michael Mantra ~ Sonic Satori (1992) • [binaural / drone / new age]

binaural programs, healing frequencies, 432 Hz, hemi-synch, solfeggio frequencies, brainwave entrainment... today's youtube is full of this kind of videos which gather millions of views ~ which only means they work, thanks to science, placebo effect, wishful thinking or some sort of magic. as sociologists say, it doesn't matter that much what people believe, what matters it's the consequence of their belief. these consequences are showing that this kind of product never ceased to exist, even with the transition from analog to digital media or to software (i'm pretty sure many of you remember "audio-drugs", "binaural beats generator" programs and the likes). but yeah, this sort of music was at the very source of the genre, well before the digital era ~ Monroe Products, Zygon, Dr. Jeffrey Thompson... numerous tapes of mind-altering audio were produced in amounts of hundreds of thousands (or maybe even millions) of copies, which is unimaginable today, despite all the physical media revival. Michael Mantra probably didn't have so much popularity as above-mentioned figures but he was a huge influence in the Bay Area's early ambient scene of the 90s. in the late 80s his Tranquil Technology Music label produced a good number of tapes under different aliases (Jon Now, Enid Lopez, The Solutionist) which later got rediscovered thanks to dub/ambient producer Rod Modell who cited Mantra as his spiritual teacher and sound design mentor. Mantra's concept of "soft noise" ~ a gentle mixture of manipulated nature sounds and synth soundscapes ~ played very well at the edge of 80s and 90s, when private pressed new age genre was giving way to what we call ambient and dub techno now. bringing together such concepts as Nada Yoga, Tai Chi and musique concrète, Michael Mantra created his own sound philosophy which focused on intention as the primary creative force, and on healing effect as its result. Mantra believed that all the negative emotions can be transformed using sound and that music can stop wars if everyone in the world would take a minute to listen and calm their minds. his own life wasn't easy in many ways and ended abruptly with an aggressive form of cancer, but nothing ever changed his belief in the transformative powers of carefully, intentionally and spiritually developed sound. Tranquil Technology Music, 1992 00:00 B-A: North Of The Equator 22:20 B-B: South Of The Equator