Flooting Grooves - Upsyde Downe (2007)
FLOOTING GROOVES is Pearce Van Der Merwe. Born in Cape Town in 1975, he grew up in South Africa and Italy, surrounded by music. Having a varied background ranging from classical to jazz, rock and related styles, he started playing flute after hearing Jethro Tull. Groups like Ozric Tentacles and Pink Floyd opened him up to Psychedelia and that's where his journey began!
A party in Amsterdam in 2000 changed the course of things forever, marking Pearce's introduction to the trance scene, with its addictive and infectious grooves! Another turning point was the meeting of like-minded musicians and beings Dan Symons (a.k.a Dymons) and Ajja Leu (one half of Yab Yum) who both played instruments and laptops. The initial meeting and jamming eventually led to Pearce moving to Switzerland to join The Peaking Goddess Collective (PGC): the organic chill and psytrance band formed in 2003 by Ajja, Dymons & Master Margherita, which combines laptops and synths with live instruments: Flute, Guitar, percussion, Bass & Fx.
After his beginnings with the PGC, where his flute found the perfect niche in which to evolve, he started to participate actively in the production of the collective's tracks. Soon, he was also producing music solo, finding his own sound and ultimately performing live: FLOOTING GROOVES! Ethnic, groovy, floaty and psychedelic, his music ranges from chill to airy progressive beats. His performances are always a success and music lovers greatly appreciate the sight of the live instrument fusing with machine production.
In the past six years, Pearce has performed live at a great deal of parties and festivals including Alien Safari and Vortex (South Africa), Eden Festival (Scotland), Tribe of Frog (UK), Antaris Project (Germany), Space Pirates' Revolution (France), Solstice Festival (Ruigoord, Netherlands) the renowned Boom 2006 and Boom 2008 in Portugal and Soulclipse in Turkey, both with his FLOOTING GROOVES project and with The PGC. The trance caravan has taken him to South Africa, Switzerland, The Netherlands, Croatia, Ukraine, Italy, Scotland, Spain, Israel, Portugal, England, France, Turkey, Ireland and Germany.
Since 2004, FLOOTING GROOVES has released a number of tracks on Peak, Electrik Dream, Vertigo, La Magica Boutique, Celestial Dragon, Space Tepee Music, Elestial, Moonloop and Syncronize. He has contributed to most Peak Records releases with down tempo tracks for the chill compilations as well as chill intros and outros for the night-time compilations. More releases are to come!
The FLOOTING GROOVES full-length debut album "Upsyde Downe" was released on Peak Records in 2007 and received fantastic reviews. Since then, he released two more debut albums along with his collaborative projects: “Organika” with The Peaking Goddess Collective (Peak 2007), and “Organic Space Age” with Cosmosophy (a Dymons - Flooting Grooves collaboration) (Elestial 2009). His eagerly awaited second album “Psydeburns” is scheduled for release on Peak Records in the autumn of 2009.
May his trails be happy and fruitful, and may your trails cross his! Peak Records - Switzerland's first psytrance record label
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