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Influenced by the Avant-Garde experiments of Karlheinz Stockhausen and the trippy Rock music of early Pink Floyd, along with the Minimalist patterning of Steve Reich and Philip Glass and time suspending concepts of Indian music, Berlin-based artists like Tangerine Dream used new kinds of instruments to create a new kind of music - which was not only based on compositional and technological factors but also on a unique political and social climate. Free System Projekt, Brendan Pollard and Hashtronaut are among an ever-growing group of people who express themselves in a mode established in the unique Spacemusic realizations first heard in a now long-gone Germany of the early 1970s. Each an established artist in their own right, they work together to great effect on the CD Time Out of Mind (77'14"). Phaedra, Rubycon and Ricochet ring in our ears as this album unfolds. Often using gear specific to the original Spacemusic era, this ensemble replicates the arrangement and instrumentation as well as the mood and atmosphere of the classic LPs of the day. Exercising exquisite non-narrative tendencies, they leave enough space between sounds and notes so that imagination may fill in meaning for each piece. A wonderful tension is felt between the mechanistic sequencer patterns cycling beneath the line of an ascending lead melody - sounded with a voice that utters no words. These and other subtle profundities expose the elemental power of this music. The genre has aged remarkably well - now on into an age of digitized sound. The impression of deep consequence still remains in the founding works while the generations that have followed continue to open up new and interesting territory. The experience is inexplicable but utterly satisfying.
- Chuck van Zyl/STAR'S END 5 November 2009 |
