TYGER

This is a Tangerine Dream album that really has the fan-base split. Edgar Froese, Chris Franke and Paul Haslinger bring in Jocelyn Smith to put her vocals to several of William Blake's poems. TD deserves some credit for taking chances like this especially with the knowledge of the mostly negative reaction to the vocals on the album Cyclone.

Tyger, London and Smile all feature Smith with varying degrees of success. London may be the song that the vocal styles are a little at odds at first but "The Fly" and instrumental sections make up for it. The gem on the album is Alchemy of The Heart, an all instrumental workout that starts softly, builds in pace and then ends softly. I only wish that Edgar's guitar was given more time to really raise the roof. The CD version ends with the 2 part 21st century Common Man and Vigor, which all were not on the original album release. All three are raise the tempo and are welcome additions. Another difference on the CD release is the vocals are treated on Tyger along with some additional programming. I like all of the changes on the newer release.

3.5 raised to a 4 star rating for the risk taking that really paid off.