This week, a beloved project that brought fantastic uplifting vibes in the early years of the scene, the terrific British band ‘Green Nuns of the Revolution’.

With their first productions taking place in 1994 (though partying in Goa had started some time before), the band largely consisted of Dick Trevor (still very active as a producer and DJ) and Matt Coldrick – though the first track “Whirling Dervish” was written by Coldrick and his roommate Sev Burden, a trance DJ who would introduce his flatmate to Trevor. The two producers produced a series of hits the Flying Rhino label (with a couple of singles released elsewhere) before Neil Cowley joined the project in its final few years.

The name of the project comes from the name of Qadaffi’s personal guards, known as the Revolutionary Nuns or Green Nuns (I’m not making this up!).

Good humour and positive vibes are definitely a key component to the group’s energy. The track presented here, ‘Ring of Fire’, is the B side on the Flying Rhino ‘Afterburner’ EP – and all the titles here have a story to tell. Side A is ‘Two Vindaloos And An Onion Bhagee’ (Indian food that is a reference to Goa), so the meaning of Side B’s ‘Ring of Fire’ might be clearer if you consider the meaning of ‘Afterburner’ in the context of what might happen biologically some time after eating Indian food…

GNOR’s sound is characterized by a high-energy pulse and raging 303 sounds, and tracks are regularly sprinkled with funny samples, and this classic track is no exception. The rapid-paced baseline, spacey ‘whooshy’ sounds (far too rare in today’s productions), beautifully crystalline figurations in the upper registers, a catchy riff… and then all kinds of mayhem breaks out midway through the track! The brilliant sample, “OK, space cadets, prepare to hurtle through the cosmos” comes from a Ren & Stimpy cartoon and is an excellent mood raiser that connects to the space-infused psychedelic mindset of party-goers of the time.

There is an extended mix that includes a longer introduction and some extended sections in the track, released on DAT Records’ first compilation Analog Dreams:

A masterful production by amazing musicians and a classic from the Golden Age of Goa!