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Elly Roberts reviews
Voiceprint Records
- April 2007
- Rating: 6/10
It must have been a daunting task,marrying contemporary ambient music with literature from the past.
Tangerine Dream has pulled it off, but the music could have beenmore interesting in terms of dynamics.
Dedicated to Pink Floyds Syd Barrett (deceased July 2006), German ’60sband Tangerine Dream soldier on with a tribute to the influential spiritof the legendary musical mind. In addition, TG use adapted lyrics fromEnglish and American poets from 17th and 18th century literature byBianca F. Acquaye.
Music is written by Edgar Froese (a former classical music student) andThorsten Quaeschning, with one traditional Irish song, track 7.
Now into their fourth decade as an ever-shifting line-up, currently aneight-piece in the studio, with only one founder member on board Froese many have dubbed them self-indulgent post-psychedelic electric doodlers.Here, however, if you check the liner notes, theres a host of realinstruments such as violin, mandolin, Irish bouzouki, bodhran, dobro,blues harp (harmonica) and usual drums, guitars, bass.Pleasingly, its not all left to electronics.
Whatever the tag, they remain a cult band across Europe to this day.Madcaps Flaming Duty, musically, is something of a departure, thoughtheres a strong element of restrained grandeur about it all. As leadingpurveyors of the ambience genre, much copied these days, Froese andco have made an good album that could be listened to at any time of dayor night, even if the tracks average at the 5-minute mark.
At its heart is a high level of serenity, a real rarity in rock music. Asif to prove a musical point, it opens with haunting blues harp leading toa spacey sojourn of around seven minutes, accompanied by cultured singerChris Hausl, a vocal dead-ringer for Rufus Wainwright.
Upping the pace just a bit, Shape My Sin glides along beautifully,though theres a lack of crescendo, segued by floating ballad The BlessedDamozel, again lacking any kind of defining direction. Hausl rescues theday on The Divorce, with his singing shining through at every level.
A Dream Of Death is the first really interesting piece, containingrestrained dynamics via a brilliant guitar solo around the 4-minute mark.Things revert to a lazy point once again for Hear The Voice, Mad Song,Man, Hymn and The Problem
Lake Of Pontchartrain is equally laid back, though the band delveinto a more Celtic mood. Finally breaking the mould, a thrusting dance beatcarries One Hour To Madness, though it drops the pace to allows somemore guitar exploits to surface.
Weblink:tangerinedream-music.com
The full list of tracks included are :
1. Astrophel And Stella
2. Shape My Sin
3. The Blessed Damozel
4. The Divorce
5. A Dream Of Death
6. Hear The Voice
7. Lake Of Pontchartrain
8. Mad Song
9. One Hour Of Madness
10. Man
11. Hymn To Intellectual Beauty
12. Solution Of All Problems
Elly Roberts passed away in 2011, but he was a man who was so passionate about all types of music and loved meeting his musical heroes, such as Mick Hucknall at a book signing at the Trafford Centre, Manchester in 2007.
A former teacher and also a music journalist, DJ and radio presenter on local community station Calon FM, plus appearances on BBC Radio Wales, BBC Radio Cymru and BBC Radio 2, Elly started doing reviews for DVDfever.co.uk in 2004 and he did the majority of the CD and concerts reviews on the website.
I know also that he loved getting away for the summer to Spain and I hope that wherever he is now he is enjoying the hot sunshine and, as one of his friends has said on his Facebook page, that he is interviewing his musical heroes.