Tangerine Dream
Green Desert

At the peak of their debut period, certainly the most significant, the German band Tangerine Dream led by Edgar Froese produced the album "Green Desert," which was, however, released posthumously, not in the year of production (which was 1973).

"Green Desert" sums up a phase of innovation and defines what is not only the typical form of the trio's compositions but also the typical form of their albums, featuring at least one long, purely cosmic suite and some shorter tracks.

At the time, Tangerine had become a reference point for the so-called Cosmic School, which developed primarily in Germany and gained musical notoriety for the cross-use of synthesizers, often combined with more traditional instruments. While bands like ELP were producing albums of baroque and symphonic rock, mixing the narrative suggestions of progressive rock with the virtuoso delusions of frenzied keyboardists, more moderate ensembles like Tangerine Dream used technology to create sprawling sidereal environments and atmospheres based on a virtuosity of ideas rather than hands.

"Green Desert" is an excellent example, although not the most original, of what the group was capable of doing and conveying to the listener. Far from cold despite an inevitably somewhat intellectual approach, the Tangerine painted new sonic worlds focusing on the merging of the various instruments used, which ranged from percussion to moogs. Perhaps reinterpreting part of psychedelia with a sort of total awareness and control, they abolished the dominance of guitars and voice to let tones unfettered by too-consolidated genres dominate the scene. And what may seem obvious today was not at all between 1970 and 1973. Apart from sporadic (and ingenious) solo voices in the midst of an era now openly progressive - see Faust, the Floyds of Ummagumma, and little else - no one had yet arrived where Froese and Franke were already evolving with a sure hand.

Suffice it to say that only a short time later, Jean Michel Jarre managed to achieve much more extensive fame and financial success by simplifying and popularizing the sound that Tangerine had honed and perfected in an elitist key. The musical themes and the way of creating atmosphere by Froese were the starting point of a "cosmic pop school" - if one can say so - of which Jarre became the celebrated standard-bearer.

"Green Desert" is a fitting example in this sense because with the tracks on side B, it shows the potential of the cosmic sound and all its future implications. While on one side there is still a challenging, almost initiatory vein in the way of crafting sound textures, which in the nearly 20-minute suite that gives the album its title unfurls between arcane sci-fi suggestions and subtle minimalism, on the other, there is the stellar majesty of "White Clouds" that opens up wondrous horizons and also engages the less accustomed listener. From this wonderful piece derives the path that leads Tangerine Dream out of the niche and decrypts what until then might have seemed an exercise in style committed to creating a void around.

Were you expecting a more precise description of the music? Well... these are albums to be listened to in total immersion. There are no lyrics, no predominant mood illustrators. The album is not the most significant of Tangerine Dream's; but I could never advise newcomers to start with "Zeit" or "Alpha Centauri."