RICOCHET

First official live release of TANGERINE DREAM during its "golden" era, "Ricochet" is simply their best album from this period, as well as a magisterial tour de force. A noticeable fact is that, during the 70's concerts, as many other electronic bands, the German pioneers didn't play their studio compositions but instead offered a new entirely improvised performance every time.

For this record, extracts from the 1975 tour in France and England were selected among nearly 50 hours of recording. Some parts have been edited and others added in a studio, in order to propose the best quality and sound possible. This will become a recurrent method on TANGERINE DREAM live albums. However, the result often justifies the mean. Compared to their studio works such as "Rubycon" and "Phaedra", the music is much more melodic and accessible, but this is not pejorative or less interesting here.

Supposedly recorded in France, Part 1 is my favorite. Its spacey beginning unveils a middle-eastern guitar melody supported by a majestic drumming. You're lost in the desert, looking for an ancient legendary temple. Then powerful hypnotic sequences weave a splendid whirling maelstrom of trippy sequences. This unbelievable meditative pre-trance passage may well be the spaciest ever in the history of synthesizer music! You are now projected into another dimension. The ending then reuses the theme from the beginning. These epic 17 minutes are one of the best TD compositions, and simply one of the greatest achievements of the progressive electronic genre.

Part 2 is an extract from a Croydon concert at Fairfield Hall, October 23th 1975. The complete performance has now been remastered and released on the Bootleg Box Set 1 in 2003. Less structured, softer, this second track is more a long improvisation. The beautiful melancholic piano and flute opening melody was added in at the Manor Studio. Then trippy synthesizer loops display a far away magic landscape. This musical theme will become a favorite leitmotiv at concerts. Froese's guitar appear, and after a short passage with strange voices and flute, reminiscent of "Atem", the main theme comes back, however with a little different sequence and atmosphere. The keyboards sometimes sound a little jazzy.

What parts precisely have been recorded live or studio? We're surely never know. But the most important is that "Ricochet" is a diamond in the history of electronic music. Ahead of its time, this live album is also the first TD record truly accessible by newcomers, and good entry point if you want to discover the band. Furthermore, the sound quality is very good.

An essential masterpiece, best live TANGERINE DREAM album, and perhaps best TANGERINE DREAM album ever. If you had to choose only one disc from Froese and co., choose this one. "Ricochet" will transport you to another world...

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