STARBOUND COLLECTION

After the start-off with a vocal and instrumental selection of Divina Commedia compositions, Tangerine Dream choose to endeavour in a powerful compilation project, pulling it off in less than a month and conceiving nine full such compiled releases. Unfortunately, all nine have the same basic impression, especially when the majority of them have a disappointing quality: it all seems a project of decisive steps, but purely labeled efforts (the change into Eastgate, made one year ago, possibly making Froese think of new ideas in superficial ways); it all seems a peaceful and convenient, but hard to accept work of reviving old material (if not actually doing a worse thing of compiling pieces and music with an already long record of appearing in boxes and compilations). To add, seven of nine are available only for download, so that they seem the heavy dose of fan(atic)-made material, in a commercial way that has long stopped surprising. Anyway, checking these compilations is a thing of desire, and the overall quality is from modest downwards, yet this 2007 kick-off Tangerine Dream have made is certainly disappointing.

Starbound Collection opens as one of four "collection" albums (besides the previous two Dante Collection volumes, which add the number to six "collections") that evoke a different period, different albums and a relatively different sort of "tangerine" music. The program is, thus, very expected and usual, but the quality pays heavily with its cold charm and its unappealing hope of reviving both the music and the atmosphere of those times. The following Silver Siren will be a worse example, while Ocean Waves will be a ruined kind of good imagination and Cyberjam Collection will stick nicely. Starbound Collection with its ugly promotional cover has actually the advantage of compiling from albums like Turn Of The Tides or Tyranny Of Beauty (and Rockoon or 220 Volt Live as additional excerpts), two albums compiled or played greatly, but nevertheless contouring solid musical choices.

Turn Of The Tides is probably the most successful and passionate Tangerine Dream album in the whole view of the 90s, while Tyranny Of Beauty is down a couple of steps as quality and fire, but also contributes to the ambiance of a full style within the middle of the decade. Both albums are generally appreciated, even with the highlight on Tangerine Dream's new-music or new-age ideas shoving more than a character, the 1994 hit having an electric electronic taste, full of dynamic melodies, transparent rhythms or very absorbing sounds and abstracts. Tyranny Of Beauty is, unfortunately, a heavy deal, full of the same absorbing melodies, but also made in a tiresome, programmatic, electronic-dizzy movement. Since Body Corporate from Rockoon is also part of the compilation (we'll leave 220 Volt for the fun of discovering how powerful Tangerine Dream can perform live), it's best to mention the tropical, yet instable and poppy energy the music has in it. Anyway, all of the three, main studio albums have had their share of being compiled, remixed or even subtly reworked/reimagined. The good hit of an album soon turns, after all, into an industry and an endless echo.

Starbound Collection is no surprise, it doesn't even worth more than a couple of shots, but has an edge of a good inspiration in choosing, mainly, two of the albums in which the wheels of electronic music, ambiance and melodic pieces were offered nicely by Tangerine Dream. The notes on the material don't tell of any remix being coupled with the original music, but that doesn't mean the 90s music wasn't, in more than one way, an age of modern sounds, flashy expressions and remixed old techniques.

Two stars for the entire compilation brand, but one better star for choosing from, most likely, the best 90s albums. The music can be, therefore, tonic, dreamy or moderately moving.

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Posted 7:00:33 AM EST, 12/26/2007