1993 was the year I dived into raves and dance music, after accidentally finding myself at at a Tribal Energy rave at Cooltan in Brixton around Easter. That night literally changed my life. But dance music was singles based and it was compilations that really opened a window onto all the club tracks that became my soundtrack for the rest of the decade. So here's 20 amazing dance comps from 93 that I love to this day.
Virtualsex - absolutely essential techno-soul comp. Rhythm is Rhythm, Carl Craig, Kenny Larkin, B12, Kirk Degiorgio. Every track is now a bona fide classic.
New Electronica - American And European Technological Innovations - Vol : 1
New Electronica - Chronological Harmonisations - Vol. 1 - the New Electronica comps were for sale everywhere in the early 90s and were an incredible window into the techno scene at a time of limited runs, imports, white labels and no having no idea of what was what or where to get it.
Detroit Techno Soul Compilation - self explanatory title, great comp from Eddie Flashin Fowlkes.
Diy – Strictly 4 Groovers - perhaps more downtempo than their DJ sets, but a classic chill northern house comp, leaning into the ambient techno sound that was all over the place at the time.
Trance Europe Express - varied, interesting, everything that trance wasn't after '95.
X-Mix-1 - The MFS-Trip - the X-Mix series are probably my favourite mix CD series, but while it went onto be a techno series from the second one (Laurent Garnier), the first entry has Paul Van Dyk catching the peak of early 90s euro trance when it was new and fresh and exciting.
Trancemaster³ - Eternal Oceanic
Trancemaster 4 · Tribal Chill Out
Trancemaster 5 · The Hardtrance Experience
Trancemaster 6 · Aural Brainfood
Speaking of early 90s euro-trance being at it's peak, the prolific Trancemaster series had 4 comps out. Ignore the subtitles - 'Tribal Chill Out' is in exactly the same vein as 'The Hardtrance Experience'. I love these, but in my head the series ended at vol. 7 and didn't go on to vol. 76 (really!) all through the bad trance years...
Harthouse Compilation Chapter 2 (Dedicated To The Omen) - German techno-trance at its best.
Dub House Disco 2000 - Guerilla Records comp from when progressive house was groovy and fun, not boring and linear.
XL-Recordings: The Fourth Chapter - stepping away from the straight up breakbeat hardcore on vol 3 from '92 (which is one of the best comps evah), it's more varied straying into house and trance - I caned this when it came out.
The Joint LP - 93 was the year hardcore turned into jungle and here is Suburban Base & Moving Shadow turning out one of the best comps from that time.
The Definition Of Hardcore - and here's Reinforced Records with another one of the best hardcore-turning-into-Jungle comps.
Happiness & Darkness (Further Adventures In Jungle Tekno) - The JungleTekno series was a great lower budget, easy to find introduction to the early Jungle scene. Contains Valley of the Shadows.
Illegal Pirate Radio - loads of great obscure, rough as fuck hardcore/Jungle. Excellent comp.
Hardcore Leaders II
Hard Leaders III - Enter the Darkside
Two more excellent hardcore comps loaded with classics.
