When German band Tangerine Dream appeared on the scene in the early 1970s, their main interest was in experimenting with pure sound. They weren’t musicians in the accepted sense, and onstage didn’t have setlists. ‘Live,’ Tangerine Dream simply improvised; the three members sat in front of, and manipulated, enormous custom-built synths which, back in 1975, were quite enormous, and everything they did was simply spontaneous improvisation. Edgar Froese, say, might start something like a synth sequence, and Peter Baumann and Christopher Franke would simply follow and add other sounds and, gradually, something would emerge. Franke said, “What we do is composed in the moment, it’s live.”
Very often, audience members couldn’t ascertain which ‘musician’ was responsible for which sound. They had no stage presence, other than just sitting and performing, though Edgar Froese later started walking about when he played guitar, and they built their reputation largely by weaving sonic landscapes which were influential in the evolution of what was to become known as ‘ambient music.’
The album title From Virgin To Quantum reflects the fact that the setlist across these three discs ranges from when they were on the Virgin label in the 70s, right up to their recent Quantum album. It was recorded in the splendour of Coventry Cathedral in Sept 2022, reprising a show Tangerine Dream had played in the same building on October 4th 1975 (interest declared .. I was at the 1975 concert being, at the time, a student at nearby Warwick University) although they now have a different three piece line-up, none of whom were even alive in 1975!
Tangerine Dream fitted perfectly into the early-mid 1970s when prog was in the ascendancy, when bands were engaged in musical experimenting with longer pieces, and album tracks of twenty minutes were not unknown. The Dream’s evocative sonic landscapes gelled nicely with the ethos of the time, and what they did with experiments in sound was quite amazing. Fifty years on, they’re not quite as revolutionary but are still making interesting sounds, some of which appeal to the mainstream. Their 2017 album Quantum Gate, from which they play a couple of pieces, their first after founder member Edgar Froese died, even made the UK dance charts. The main difference is that the current band now plays shorter pieces and there’s a lot less improvisation.
Tangerine Dream made their name with mostly melody-free instrumentation, pulsating synth patterns, helping create a sonic landscape which became a benchmark for later bands. This set is largely based on this, with well-known tracks like ‘Stratosfear,’ ‘Phaedra,’ ‘Love On A Real Train,’ ‘Continuum’ and ‘Raum’ featured, plus a gorgeous version of ‘Ricochet’ which was redolent of 70’s Tangerine Dream, plus a glorious version of ‘White Eagle’. After an hour, Marillion’s guitar man, Steve Rothery, is introduced, playing on ‘Kiew Mission parts 1′ and ‘2,’ where he adds a new sonic layer to the sound, as well as stellar guitar bursts to ‘Cloudburst Flight’. My only issue with ‘Kiew Mission’ is Hoshiko Yamane’s vocals were indecipherable.
Tangerine Dream were always much more than just a series of ‘electronic drones, bleeps and buzzes.’ They took listeners on an ‘electronic journey’ which, in Coventry, they did in some style.
