Tangerine Dream: 35th Phaedra Anniversary Concert

Weighing in at nearly three full hours, this concert—filmed June 11, 2005 at London's Shepherd's Bush Empire—features godfathers of electronica (or godfather, since founder Edgar Froese is the only original member here) Tangerine Dream performing a whopping 26-song set. Although even casual listeners have been exposed to the Dream's music on motion picture soundtracks (including Sorcerer, Risky Business, and Legend), this concert is squarely pitched at fans. Roughly the first half of the concert is a greatest hits package from the band's most influential period—from 1974's Phaedra through 1986's Underwater Sunlight. Seated with their backs to the audience, the synthesizer-playing trio of Froese, his son Jerome, and Thorsten Quaeschning mostly stare at large monitors displaying various sequencer runs, as they present classic Dream cuts, including: the rarely performed “Mysterious Semblance at the Strand of Nightmares”; the album title tracks “Rubycon, Pt. 1” (with a little nod to Wagner), “Force Majeure,” “Warsaw in the Sun,” “Logos,” and “Poland”; the ethereal non-album track “Silver Scale”; and the haunting piano solo “Song of the Whale.” Unfortunately, the second half is far less musically memorable—drawing from the group's dance electronica fluff period beginning in the ‘90s and featuring entries such as “Backstreet Hero” and “Meta Morph Magic.” On the plus side, the latter set is more visually interesting, since the trio finally turn to face the audience with their Roland and Yamaha keyboards, backed by percussionist Iris Camaa, saxophonist Linda Spa, and guitarist Zlatko Perica, but by the time the concert concludes with an anemic cover of Jimi Hendrix's “Purple Haze,” early fans will be wincing, while non-fans will have long since reached a catatonic state. Presented in Dolby Digital 5.1, this is an optional purchase. Aud: P. (R. Pitman)