Return to the Source


Return to the Source was a London-based Goa Trance club and offshoot record label run by partners Chris Decker, Mark Allen, Janice Duncan and Phil Ross. Along with the recurring Escape from Samsara party, which also had a monthly Friday night slot at The Fridge in the mid-1990s, it was an early mainstay of Trance in its underground days and through its breakout in the late 1990s. According to Allmusic, its "compilation series of the best trance music on the scene...brought Goa trance to the mainstream hordes".
On Fri 1 August 2014, the four partners got together for a 21st Anniversary Reunion Party at Electric, Brixton with many of the artists who played at the early parties and appeared on albums including Tsuyoshi Suzuki, Mark Allen, Man With No Name, Dr Alex Paterson, Mixmaster Morris.
The beginning of the club was documented by music journalist Ian Gittins in the book that accompanied the first Return to the Source compilation 'Deep Trance and Ritual Beats'. At page 8, Gittins writes:

This emphasis on spirituality and ritual was carried on at the RTTS events, which were opened with a ceremony involving tribal instruments brought along by club-goers.
The Source flourished alongside the musical genre of Goa Trance and its successor Psychedelic Trance running monthly club nights or 'parties' at The Rocket in North London's Holloway Road, Brixton's Fridge, Bagley's in Kings Cross and a number of larger events at Brixton Academy...the last one of which was in 2002.
The Source produced 18 compilation albums of upbeat Trance and more downtempo Ambient music, as well as the 'Deck Wizards' series of DJ mix compilation CDs from Source residents and regular's including Mark Allen, Tsuyoshi Suzuki, Chris 'Chrisbo' Smith. A series of chilled albums entitled Ambient Meditations included mixes from Mark Allen, Dr Alex Paterson, Youth and Mixmaster Morris.
"In September 1996, the promoter John Emmanuel Gartmann held America's first psychedelic trance rave Return to the Source -- a now legendary party at the Liberty Science Center in Jersey City," wrote Simon Reynolds in The New York Times.

''Ambient Meditations'' series

A series of four mix albums was released on the Return to the Source label:
  • Ambient Meditations 1 mixed by Mark Allen
  • Ambient Meditations 2 mixed by Dr Alex Paterson
  • Ambient Meditations 3 mixed by Youth
  • Ambient Mediations 4: God Bless the Chilled mixed by Mixmaster Morris