Unmastered early topline rough cut to flush out arrangement, vocals, and instruments. Ugly, raw, and unrefined...but it shows how the heart of a song starts to take form even in the earliest phases of the project. Believe it or not, all of the instrumentals on this version were done in a $5 Android app (Caustic).

Not ready for prime time at all...but even here you can hear that it's about the music first and the engineering and polish second.  If this doesn't work, no amount of effects or mixdown or mastering will make a song good. It needs to be there from the start. 

i really love how emotionally huge this song is even in the earliest cut with so much fixing still needed.

The final product is definitely superior, but this has heart and its own special earthy appeal, I feel. 

Hope you enjoy it. 🙏🏻 

Alone - with Jodie Poye (very rough concept mix - unfinished).

Stones

Stones (Extended Mix)

Heart Connected

Heart Connected (Brian McCalla Extended Remix) [feat. Megan Sampson]

Heart Connected (Brian McCalla Remix) [feat. Megan Sampson]

Here's a new Sound of You set with some sounds I've been playing to keep warm this winter. I've been having fun threading together deep layered progressive melodies with some rave atmospheres, music for the late hours. Be well <3

Artwork is by Cat Huss.

DJ James Black guest mix for Dave Pearce Delirium podcast April 2025 right before our Brighton Trance Anthems party on April 4th. 25 minute mini mix previewing some of my favourite tracks at the moment!

Keep an eye out for my FULL SET from this event COMING SOON!
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James Black Delirium Guest Mix 2025 Tracklist

1. Vadim Zhukov & Megan Sampson - Hearts Connected (Brian McCalla Remix)
2. The Thrillseekers & Aly & Fila - Es Vedra
3. Steve Hill x Technikal feat. The Morrighan - Cloudbusting x Universal Nation 
4. Talla 2xlc & Zyrus 7 - 1998
5. Lange & James Black Presents - Pushed To The Edge

DJ James Black Guestmix for Dave Pearce Delirium Apr 25

01. SUNDA - The Dragon (Extended Mix) [LANDSCAPES MUSIC] 
02. Solarstone - Sovereign (Ultimate Extended Remix) [Black Hole]
03. Brian McCalla feat Kate Miles - Hidden Lies [Subculture]
04. Starpicker - Olivia (Extended Mix) [Extrema Global Music] 
05. DR. DRTY vs Stefanno b2b Julianno - Feel Alive (Mostly Cloudy Extended Tech Remix) [A Tribute To Life] 
06. Paul Rigel feat. Miss Jane - Longing For You (DJ T.H. Extended Remix) [2Rock Uplifting]
07. Signum - Homage (Extended Mix) [Anjunabeats]
08. Man With No Name x Fish56Octagon x David Forbes - Floor Essence (Extended Mix) [Perfecto Records]
09. Ralphie B & Frank Waanders pres Collide1 - The Dynasty [Who's Afraid Of 138] 
10. Andrew Peters - Distant Echoes (Extended Mix) [High Voltage Recordings]
11. Ronski Speed & Audrey Gallagher - Look At Us Now (Extended Mix) [Amsterdam Trance Records]  
12. Phil Dinner - The Battle (Extended Mix) [Abora Recordings]

Solar Power Sessions 939 - Suzy Solar (Uplifting Trance)

The Other Side

The Other Side (Dub Mix)

The Other Side (Extended Mix)

01. Brian McCalla, James Black Presents, Sinead McCarthy - The Other Side (Extended Mix) [Pure Trance] 
02. Solewaas - Opal (Original Mix) [Alter Ego Records] 
03. Driftmoon, Helsløwed - Orion (Misja Helsloot Extended Remix) [Black Hole Recordings]
04. Talla 2XLC & DJ Tandu - Angelfalls (Extended Mix) [Technoclub Retro] 
05. Lasgo - Something (Talla 2XLC Remix) [mp3] 
06. Laucco - Atris (Extended Mix) [Chasing Dreams Music] 
07. Transaphonic - Waves of Infinity (Extended Mix) [High Voltage Recordings] 
08. Lyterra - Momento [Extrema Global Music] 
09. Bryce Keuris X Henry Moe X Aylin - Between The Stars (Original Mix) [Nocturnal Knights] 
10. Bryan Kearney & Plumb - God Help Me (Extended Mix) [Armind]
11. C-Systems - 1000 Miles Apart (Extended Mix) [Dreamstate Records] 
12. Alan Morris & Leddra Chapman - Never Saw You Coming (Extended Mix) [Amsterdam Trance Records]

Solar Power Sessions 941 - Suzy Solar (Uplifting Trance)

Brian McCalla has been performing and creating electronic music for three decades starting as a young amateur composer / MIDI connoisseur and DX7 /Juno programmer. Influenced by Tangerine Dream and Jean-Michel Jarre in the 80's, Depeche Mode and New Order in the early 90's, and then in his introduction to Techo and Trance starting at raves in the late 90's and 00's he developed his affinity for the pensive and melodic tracks of Paul Van Dyk, Rank 1, Paul Oakenfold, and later those of Cosmic Gate, Markus Schulz, Roger Shah, and John O'Callaghan.

A prominent and active user to this day of hardware synthesizers and samplers with virtual instruments backing his tracks, he believes that the soul of music still lies in the tactile, immediate creativity afforded by playing actual keys on real synthesizers. Regardless of whether you're talking about his two Access Virus(es?), Roland JP-8000, Alesis Fusion, Korg Triton, Roland MC-303, Korg Microsampler, Novation X-Station, Korg Radias, Alesis Ion, Korg Microstation, Roland MV-8800, Arturia Microbrute, Korg Volcas (all of them), Novation Xiosynths (4 of them), Korg Monologue, M-Audio Venom, or Korg Kaossilator Pro, they arelike singers to him: each with their own voice and personality  (though he admits that Sylenth, Z3TA, and Massive genuinely do have a character of their own, as well). 

He's a proud "nerd" when it comes to synthesis and timbre design and can banter about whilst comfortably throwing synth vernacular around like it's his native language (indeed, he's the Top Writer on Quora in the topics of Synthesizers, Trance Music, and Samplers), he doesn't let the technobabble distract him from the organic and visceral emotion that music ultimately derives from the transistors and and resistors.

"I'm actually a professional engineer and green / renewable technology consultant in my day job" (he's modest; as he also teaches engineering and holds undergraduate and graduate degrees in physics, mathematics, mechanical engineering, energy management, nonlinear dynamics,  and STEM education) "but as Nate Raubenheimer's (Protoculture) soon-to-be-timeless album title so eloquently suggests, Music IS More Than Mathematics, and I realized early on that the technology and phrasing and mixing and counterpoint and sidechains and filtering are all servants to music as the best tool by which living, loving, feeling HUMANS communicate EMOTION."

"To me, Trance is the pinnacle of that relationship; and while the commercialization of dance music has led to the decline of melody and feeling in favor of 'drops, wubs, and sub-bass  air pulses', the delicate ecstasy of the breakdown and sublime surge of absolute natural euphoria that progressive, uplifting, Psy, hard, tech, Goa, vocal, dream, and epic sub-genres afford us is something impossible to quantify, but unmistakable once you've been tasted its kiss."

If hardware synths are his tools, then choppy basslines, pulsing sidechained hypersaws, and passionate analog glowing leads are his weapons. Seeing tracks as 8 bar "chapters" that must be carefully staged to tell an engaging story, he sculpts the introduction, steps in rising action, climax, and denouement as a fiction author might pen the next spy thriller. 

Some may miss this analogy, though, and liken the simplicity (upon distracted first listening) of his songs to that of Hemingway in "Old Man And The Sea". 

"I've been accused of creating tracks that are too 'simple' or 'subtle', or 'old school' and that's true. My songs are simple and the melodic content can be subtle, but it's in that innocent and sublime space that I find the most raw emotion and the perfect balance between anticipation and surprise; thus, simultaneously relaxing the listener while exciting them with periodic shots of dopamine to their synaptic clefts. In spite of their superficial simplicity, I try to include in my songs those 'eargasm' moments!"

Emotion, though, at the end of the day, governs everything that he does in his Trance compositions. 

"I often tell people that the 'EDM' and the 'Dance' monikers are only a necessary structure for Trance and not the end result. If people find that they can dance to it, great...but what I'm really hoping to do is to get their hairs to stand up and create those emotional experiences that send chills of real feeling through the core of their being. If a stream of superimposed sine waves can cause a listener to feel love...or loss...or joy, then I've done my job."

He then adds, "because I've communicated what I was feeling when I wrote it."


Stones (Extended Mix)

brianmccalla

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