From: tadream (tadream mailing list) Date: Tue, 14 Feb 95 14:44 BST Subject: Future Music TD Article Text. Really-From: CONRAD GIBBONS Requests for add/removal from this list to tadream-request@cs.uwp.edu The next message from me will contain the text of the review of Tangents and the interview with Edgar Froese as published in the December 1994 issue of Future Music magazine. The text has been kindly forwarded to me by Andy Jones, the editor of the magazine. I trust you will all join with me in thanking him for passing the article on to me so that I could pass it on to the TADREAM bulletin board. Enjoy. Andy Jones can be contacted regarding the back issues of Future Music. Feel free to give him a bell if you have any queries. He asked me to tell y'all about Future Music's own Web Site. Give it a go! The Web address is http://www.futurenet.co.uk - ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ /_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/ /_/ Conrad Gibbons, Tel. No. (0232) 382400 /_/ /_/ 8 Deramore Park South, Work Tel. No. (0232) 661166 Ext 2365 /_/ /_/ off Malone Road, Email: GDEI6348@uk.ac.qub.agv1 /_/ /_/ Belfast BT9 5JY, ROI Tel. No. (074) 38008 /_/ /_/ Northern Ireland. /_/ /_/_ ROI Address:"Lake View", Creeslough, Letterkenny, Co. Donegal, Ireland./_/ /_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/ ------------------------------ From: tadream (tadream mailing list) Date: Tue, 14 Feb 95 14:48 BST Subject: Future Music TD Article - Actual Text. Really-From: CONRAD GIBBONS Requests for add/removal from this list to tadream-request@cs.uwp.edu Tangerine Dream - Tangents (1973 - 1983) (Virgin) Tangerine Dream: *the* electronic band. Prolific in their output, pioneering in their use of sequencers, pivotal in the history of synth music, sonic experimentalism and, arguably, ambient house. Edgar Froese, the founder and only remaining member of the original line-up, has spent the last year remixing, remastering, even rebuilding highlights from the German band's ten years on Virgin. Tangents, the result, is a beautifully packaged set of five CDs and 72 page booklet, with artwork by FSOL's Buggy G Riphead and text by FM contributor Mark Prendergast. It looks stunning, and it sounds... ah, there's the rub. Froese just couldn't resist adding extra pads and melodies to the remasters. Consequently, tracks like Stratosfear, Pilots of Purple Twilight, and Rubycon suffer from a reduction in dynamics and partial loss of identity. The gossamer of White Eagle struggles to escape from smotherings of fat digital wash; on other tracks, such as Force Majeure and Sphinx Lightning, Froese has shoved anachronistic book-ends, rather than tasteful fades. Sections of live recordings have been totally studio re-recorded, and whereas Phaedra and Monolight have been reinterpreted credibly, Logos has lost all the original verve. Anybody, unaware of TD's influence, listening to them for the first time from Tangents, might wonder what all the fuss is about. At least the fourth disc, featuring TD's Virgin soundtrack work, goes mostly untainted - apart from Sorcerer, the band's most dramatic and atmospheric score. The fifth disc, comprising material never before released, has only three tracks worth searching out, and those are collaborations with former members. It proves that TD was always a group thing, and not just the creativity of one person. If only Franke, Schmoelling or Baumann had been given a hand in reworking Tangents, a second-rate, vandalised anthology could have been the definitive insight into collective electronic genius. // A riled Dave Robinson, with his old school TD colours fixed firmly on his sleeve, confronts Edgar Froese with the question "What's going on?" FM: Why have you compiled this box set now? EF: Because Virgin asked me to do it. FM: Is it not a 25 year celebration thing? EF: We recorded our first LP in 1969, released it in 1970, so, yes, it's 25 years of recording history if you like. FM: A lot of stuff on Tangents is also on Dream Sequence. Was that intentional? EF: When Virgin first asked me, I thought this was a good chance to give people back what they've given us in the form of trusting the way we went, so let's sit down and remix stuff, put it into a better sound shape, and even add one CD with unreleased material. Virgin agreed, so [the box set] was a lot of work, it took me over three quarters of a year, but as far as I'm concerned it was worth doing it. FM: You've restructured some of the tracks, like part of Logos. That section provided an essential atmosphere of climax on the original album; don't you think you've lost that with this rerecording? EF: It might have lost some of the live atmosphere - that happens naturally because it was done in a studio. In my opinion, because the original tracks are still there - Virgin have just re-released it on 20-bit mapping quality **check- I just wanted to offer them something different to what they own already. They're paying a lot of money for this box set! FM: There is that aspect, but you don't feel that you've lost the original magic where you've completely recreated the track? EF:On some tracks I'm not so sure - I can't judge myself, that's up to the audience. I thought it was worth doing it, because through all the years when I've had to listen to that stuff, requests by film directors or whatever, I always thought that could have been done better, or in a different way. So here was a chance to do things I always thought it would have been good to do. FM: Other tracks on Tangents you've added extra lines - Stratosfear**another. Surely if you came to a certain point that you were happy with, why add extra parts now? EF: First, as I just said, to give people the chance to experience the music on a different level. The other reason is a purely technical one: all the material was originally recorded between '73 and '83, and we were not millionaires back in 83, so we had to choose studios and recording facilities that were not always state of the art. There were mistaken procedures around - - I wanted to get rid of that as well, and add brighter sounds, go more into stereo, that sort of thing. FM: But what you've done to Kiew Mission: the extra parts, and the consequent loss in dynamic range - it just doesn't sound right anymore. I think it will disappoint a lot of fans. EF: That's possible, and we will respect the opinions that people have. On the other hand, we've already received lots of mail saying, hey, that's another way of listening to the stuff we've known for years, and we're glad we've got the opportunity. But a lot of people have reacted the same way you do, they say you can't change the original. If Virgin had taken all the original stuff off the market, then you would be absolutely right. But because the original stuff is there, you can have it both ways. FM: On the last few albums, many sounds have come up again and again, and what's more, they sound like presets. Are they? EF:Some sounds we've used in the past have a Tangerine Dream identity - fretless bass, choirs, DX7 sounds, 12 string guitar, we still use. On the other hand, and I find this amusing, some bands use the same sounds for 12 years and nobody cares about it! (Laughs) We make three albums with similar basics, people say it's old fashioned and [Tangerine Dream] have no ideas any more. That's funny. Because we did something quite new 25 years ago, people think you can go on doing that for the rest of the century. We cannot create miracles! FM: I agree to an extent, *but* back in 1982, you were critical of bands who returned instruments to shops with 90% of the factory presets intact. EF: I did say that, but back in 82, one thing was not as established as it is now, and that's sampling. You know, one thing I'm tired and frustrated by is the way the Tangerine Dream sounds have been stolen, copied and in some way prostituted. I don't care if people take a little cut, but I can show you records where between 10 and 15 seconds of our music has been taken. At first we were quite amused by this, but it has been done over and over. We've found 16 such records, and now we've started talking to our lawyers. So can you imagine sitting in a studio for three or four days, creating an astonishing sound, you put it on a record and someone takes it within two weeks and makes millions out of a pop record. Now if we use our unique sounds, we mix them with others so people can't steal them. Most people don't know about [the sampling problem], but it's a huge fact. FM: I only know of the Future Sound of London sampling you. EF: I know them (insistently), we are in good contact. I like their stuff - it's good and it's professionally done, but that's all I want to say about it. FM: Would you agree with Q magazine who said FSOL are the Tangerine Dream for the '90s? EF: No comment. FM: Why did you turn into, in effect, a West Coast rock band after Underwater Sunlight ('86)? EF: I foresaw the development of techno and house and ambient in London in '87 and '88. Then I felt already, what becomes of Tangerine Dream? I thought, okay, if that becomes a world development in music I don't want to be called the grandfather of it - but that happened anyway, so I couldn't do anything. I hate to be confronted with stuff that is close to [what we did]. It would have been better if people had done something completely different and left Tangerine Dream for what it is. We did the sequencer work for about 18 years, so it was good to move to song structures, and that period has ended now with a record we will release in February 95. That cycle is completed, and we will move in a completely different direction, and people will call us... I don't know... I don't care, to be quite honest! (chuckles). FM: So where will TD go next? EF: In a completely different direction, in terms of technologies; it will change the complete process of composing. We will have a short break for about a year, change systems and places, and then be back in early '96 with a different musical approach. FM: Will you tell me what that is? EF: It's very far out, I tell you! (laughs) It's definitely not Top 40! (laughs even more) FM: Will it be a return to some of what went before? EF: (emphatically) No, we never return to anything we've done, that would be stupid. The new thing will be very adventurous to us as composers. FM: A lot of people are talking about virtual reality and the control it could offer. Is it anything like that? EF: Erm... (pause) What I could tell you is that I'm not a big fan of the CD-ROM idea. I like Peter Gabriel's music, and there's a lot of work [in his CD-ROM, X-plora 1], and it's maybe a proper step into a new direction, but what it gives people musically is less than an audio CD. I don't want to criticise it, because it's the way technology is going. So I don't know if we go into the virtual reality movement or we call it something different or whatever. ______________________________________________________________________________ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ /_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/ /_/ Conrad Gibbons, Tel. No. (0232) 382400 /_/ /_/ 8 Deramore Park South, Work Tel. No. (0232) 661166 Ext 2365 /_/ /_/ off Malone Road, Email: GDEI6348@uk.ac.qub.agv1 /_/ /_/ Belfast BT9 5JY, ROI Tel. No. (074) 38008 /_/ /_/ Northern Ireland. /_/ /_/_ ROI Address:"Lake View", Creeslough, Letterkenny, Co. Donegal, Ireland./_/ /_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/