Release info – street-date: June 01/06/2015 // Formats: CD, digital download
If there’s a term that captures to the nth degree the music of DJ, composer and master-producer Tapio ‘Orkidea’ Hakanen, it’s ‘retrofuturism’. Passing from simple terminology to his own personal genre playground, its past-meets-the-future melange is the driving ethic behind every piece of music he makes.
It sees him inhabit a remarkable & singular position in electronic music. Remaining anchored to its underground, he nonetheless enjoys the type of esteem typically reserved for the biggest trance stars of stage & studio. Notable by their cache of rarity, ‘Harmonia’ is just the fourth in Orkidea’s album line, throughout his near-¼ century of electronic music creation.
Following previous long-players (‘Taika’ - 2003, ‘Metaverse’ - 2008 and ’20’ in 2011), the album continues to track the inspirations of a man who has himself gone on to influence numerous subsequent production generations.
Through collaboration, sonic reference, cover version and smartly subtle nuance, he intensely channels it all into ‘Harmonia’. Included are the Beatport #1 charting ‘Purity’, (per DJ Mag) the “trance-progressively pumping” ‘Revolution Industrielle’ and the “coolly modulating analogue synths” (MIXMAG) of ‘Slowmotion III’. It features collaborative works with Solarstone, Giuseppe Ottaviani, Activa, Lowland & others, and ‘Harmonia’ fully comprises 14 new Orkidea recordings.
On ‘Harmonia’ release, Orkidea said: “I’ve channeled over 20 years of DJ & production history into this album. It feels like a natural continuation after ‘Taika’, ‘Metaverse’ and ‘20’, but at the same time takes my sound to a new level. It’s the most dynamic and varied record I’ve done, yet at the same time the most cohesive crystallization of my musical expression. And I believe it offers something unique for the progressive & trance genres with its retrofuturistic sound.”
