The story behind Highcosmos
Highcosmos is the joint Psytrance project of Highko, German producer Heiko Quast, and Slovak producer Cosmo, Peter Kubala. The pair met in India in 2005 and combined Highko’s fast, abrasive psychedelic approach with Cosmo’s dense digital sound design. Their project developed into a distinct live act , not a one-off joint credit. Formed by Highko and Cosmo after meeting in India in 2005, with subsequent studio work in Berlin. The project quickly moved from collaboration into album-scale work, culminating in 4Real on Noise Poison Records.
Highcosmos became part of the fast, dark psychedelic circuit of the mid/late 2000s and was presented as a live project instead of merely a track-by-track pairing. Highcosmos captures an early point in the transition from dark Psytrance toward the faster, more digitally fractured production language later associated with Hi-Tech.
The project was most active in the mid-to-late 2000s; later activity is unclear.
Origins of Highcosmos
Formed by Highko and Cosmo after meeting in India in 2005, with subsequent studio work in Berlin.
The early years
The project quickly moved from collaboration into album-scale work, culminating in 4Real on Noise Poison Records.
How the career developed
Highcosmos became part of the fast, dark psychedelic circuit of the mid/late 2000s and was presented as a live project instead of merely a track-by-track pairing.
Highcosmos sound
Fast dark Psytrance built around hard-driving basslines, dense digital effects, abrupt psychedelic edits and the high-energy aesthetic that fed into the emerging mid-2000s high-speed scene.
Place in psytrance history
Highcosmos captures an early point in the transition from dark Psytrance toward the faster, more digitally fractured production language later associated with Hi-Tech.
Highcosmos today
The project was most active in the mid-to-late 2000s; later activity is unclear.
Selected releases in the archive
Related projects and collaborations
Artists with overlapping styles
Arjuna
Indian-born, Goa-raised psychedelic-trance producer and longtime Parvati Records artist whose music joins deep night-time pressure with organic, forest-leaning psychedelia.
Atriohm
Skopje-rooted psychedelic-trance project founded by brothers Sashe and Leonid Golcev and now continued by Sashe, with a major role in the development of modern forest psytrance.
Audiopathik
Mexican dark Psytrance duo of Alex Urias and Gilberto Wendlandt, associated with fast, experimental and high-intensity psychedelic sound.
Crazy Astronaut
Nikolay Golutvin’s melodic, rave-driven high-speed psychedelic-trance identity, distinct from his more experimental Furious project and strongly associated with OSOM Music.
Dark Whisper
Manuel Bellini’s dark, experimental psychedelic-trance project, associated with Alice-D Records and spanning Darkpsy, high-speed Psytrance and later Hi-Tech overlap.
Encephalopaticys
North Macedonian Psytrance project of Vasko Velickovski, closely associated with the darker Parvati and Sanaton sound of the late 2000s.