A Dance Floor for Outsiders: History of Migma Shelter in 6 Songs
A look back into the psych-trance group and their incredible music before their indefinite hiatus
This feataure is part of Idol Watch #21. You can return to the main newsletter here.
As MIGMA SHELTER announced the dissolution of its current line-up this March, the most pained response about the news came from Brazil, the idol group’s longest-standing member. “A discussion about breaking up the group was brought to me many times, and I firmly turned it down every time,” she wrote. “I really didn’t want to give up on my dreams. I wanted to deliver MIGMA SHELTER to the world. I wanted to dance together with everyone forever.” If they had yet to be close to an international breakthrough almost 8 years in, they were more than prepared to please bigger, festival-sized crowds with their arsenal of trance-pop. Their latest releases yearned to shake a larger stage as dreamy synth beats built into an epic spectacle that easily outsized many of the beat drops from the past.
The group’s music only grew more ambitious in scale as well as concept, and so the decision for MIGMA SHELTER to disband its current iteration came as rather a surprise considering the momentum behind them. The call to split was perhaps also unexpected for fans, especially for those who’ve been following them since their early years, as the members seemed in it practically for life. Their most defining period saw a tight-knit family of idols who charmed with their closeness as they awed while proudly performing their music. Their lone full-length, ALICE, is a testament to how well-conceptualized idol music could be, but moreover, it’s a document of a group at its most in tune to their chosen style but also established line-up.
The latest member additions seemed to inspire MIGMA SHELTER into their new chapter, even as key names of the past began to graduate. Their last string of EPs, what they dubbed the OZ trilogy, hinted at more growth in style and, of course, the scale in which they wished to operate. It’s uncertain if or when the group will return, but in whatever form they choose to come back, they will pick back up a spectacular legacy.
Until then, we can celebrate all the accomplishments of MIGMA SHELTER by tracing back their great catalog. Here’s the history of MIGMA SHELTER in 6 songs.
For more on MIGMA SHELTER, you can check out our past feature The Conversation: MIGMA SHELTER, published in 2020. This feature is dedicated to the memory of our contributor and friend Myrna.
“Joint” [Svaha Eraser EP, 2017]
If their predecessors in Bellring Shojo Heart threw everything at the wall to see what would stick as their sound, MIGMA SHELTER arrived nearly complete from the jump with their debut EP, Svaha Eraser. Psychedelic trance as a genre defined them musically, and later, conceptually, as they tapped into affiliated works like Alice in Wonderland to deepen their visual identity. While the meandering “Deeper” from the EP finds them still figuring how to fully adapt their chosen genre into a more pop form, “Joint” succeeds in fashioning the signature sounds, cresting builds and progressive arcs into a tightly structured dance-pop song.
See also: “Svaha Eraser,” “Compression: Free”
“Spider Line” [Names EP, 2019]
About a year in, tragedy struck for MIGMA SHELTER: all but one member graduated from the group, placing them in an indefinite hiatus. They fortunately managed to slowly build themselves back up going into as a duo in 2019 after a new recruit, marking the beginning of the act’s new era. Despite them starting practically from scratch, their production during this period sounded more solidified and purposeful as it further explored the range of its chosen genre.
Out of that year’s two EPs, Parade’s End and Names, “Spider Line” from the latter best realized their psych-trance concept. Languid synths set the scene with an euphoric glow. But the production wastes no space, tightening any loose, meandering ends to ensure the idols can deploy a sharp, fierce attack. What may have been accessories in past singles, the cybernetic synth bursts or the galloping drum loops, are now weaponized in the explosive chorus. And that rapturous bridge sustains the intensity just so, the thunderous crescendo building into the final round of the chorus. All the parts fit just right to assure maximum power. Despite the odds against them, MIGMA SHELTER figured it all out.
See also: “Parade’s End,” “69”
“Tokyo Square” [single, 2019]
MIGMA SHELTER wrapped up their fruitful 2019 with “Tokyo Square.” By the end of that year, the group finally gained some stability as they settled into a new six-member line-up. The music in their last song for the year, too, allowed itself to freely breathe. Whereas their other songs imported rather aggressive sounds when it pulled from outside subgenres—industrial in “69,” tense electro in “Names”—“Tokyo Square” trafficked in suave jazziness with its tack-on of samba during the breakdown. The single also treats its central character with empathy, encouraging the lost wanderer to just get lost in the music as they search for their place in the big city. “Don’t let me down, right now / we are all lonely monsters,” they sing in the chorus. The history of the group, then, should stand as an example of what can lie beyond that dark moment of solitude.
See also: “Coro Da Noite”
“Y” [ALICE, 2020]
Going into 2020, MIGMA SHELTER embarked on their next mission: crowdfunding the production of a new album. And after some delays, they released ALICE, still one of the finest idol full-lengths this decade. The album’s rigor in its consistency with sound and concept alone stands it above many works by the group’s peers. It also includes perhaps their strongest pop distillation of trance in my pick for their best song, “Road.”
But ALICE most importantly showcased the group’s meticulous attention to detail. MIGMA SHELTER borrowed from Alice in Wonderland to deepen the group’s concept. While the literary work admittedly makes for a cliche point of reference for a psych-trance project, the group integrated its hallmarks through ingenious means. A big example can be found in “Y,” with its choreography nodding to the caterpillar from the story. But from its disorienting lyrics to the whimsical sounds in the production, the song evoke psychedelia in subtler, more artful ways. In ALICE, MIGMA SHELTER fascinated with their rich world-building as much as their ethereal trance sounds.
See also: “It Doesn’t Matter,” “Road”
“Redo” [Redo EP, 2022]
Releases from MIGMA SHELTER slowed down a bit after ALICE yet the one-offs hardly dropped in quality. The idols hunkered down on their trance-pop workouts as strict as the steely face they put on for each release. “Redo,” though, stuck out from the pack through its sneering anger that the idols convincingly perform as though it came from a particularly personal place. The drilling electro beat houses a collection of hooks that doubles as a colorful display of personality from the members: “Blah, blah, blah,” they snap in the chorus, practically pantomiming the loud mouth they’re trying to zip. While the group can appear deeply serious on record at times, “Redo” give them the floor to let loose and reveal their humorous side for once.
“A land switched by a witch” [OZ two EP, 2023]
In 2023, MIGMA SHELTER began crafting a trance-pop trilogy inspired by yet another literary staple for pop psychedelia: The Wizard of Oz. And out of their OZ World EPs, “A land switched by a witch” from the second installment most overtly calls back to their reference. Unlike the world-building of ALICE, though, the group harnesses the thematic essence of Oz to build a great trance epic dedicated to lost souls searching to fill a void. The result is awe-inspiring through sheer EDM-pop spectacle as well as its lyrical call-to-arms.
The heft of the production in particular from the latter two OZ World EPs suggested that perhaps the group had been eyeing big-tent EDM as an inspiration. Their songs have already fulfilled their potential as material for live mixes: a year prior to the trilogy, producer/DJ Dubscribe dropped his remix of “Tokyo Square” at a festival set of his. And songs like “A land switched by a switch” tower in scale as much as firepower from the rest of their catalog, competing well with the bombs dropped in hard-trance sets built for a crowd of thousands. With the OZ World trilogy, it seemed MIGMA SHELTER could only grow bigger in sound as much as concept had their ambitions not been cut so short.
See also: “Brave”; “Any Colours”
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