WHITE EAGLE

Read a lot of the reviews here and frankly I cannot believe what I am reading. Folks do not seem to understand that Tangerine Dream is in effect three different bands (with give or take the same personnel) three different periods during which they played completely different music[s]

The first period goes until 1972/73 probably including Atem The second period is definitely the golden period the albums there are Phaedra Rubycon Ricochet Stratosphere and Cyclone Possibly Force Majeure

Then they slip into the third period and the third period is basically the very beginning of the longest period which is film music and electronic New-age film-like music. A serious fan of the band like myself 🙂🙃😉 adores all three periods equally. The genius that was Edgar Froese did not sit still he moves on ... the first period was the acid period insane to my ears in 2023 pretty difficult to listen to especially the very first album Electronic Meditation it has a chalk on the blackboard or steel scratching on steel which is very difficult to listen to for any length of time; Alpha Centauri and Zeit and Atem are very spacey you are going through the stars here you are travelling to far-flung nebulae

You cannot keep doing this for years as it is too extreme so they came down to Earth again for the most successful-musically period probably the Phaedra to Force Majeure period

There we have arguably the two most famous albums Phaedra and Rubycon there is no arguing with those they are masterpieces absolute masterpieces ... but then again you could not stay there for any length of time so Edgar and his men moved onto the very lucrative film score lodestone and stayed there forever afterwards they never returned to the Acid-fuelled 1970 Music as indeed there would be no point they did not return to the melodic early sequencer phase of Phaedra and Rubycon they went somewhere else

They went deep into the 80s and 90s the Noughties and to my knowledge although I don't listen to Tangerine Dream after 1990 ie I do not listen to the new works that is I listen to the old works which are still gobsmackingly good this album here White Eagle yes it does sound like Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark or China Crisis or any English Liverpudlian outfit from that period and it is amazingly brilliant in the way that it does have what these bands had but it does not have a voice on top of the music NO vocals but the music carries you places as did the music from the first two periods so I think in many ways some of the reviews I read here earlier on are comparing chalk and cheese. They are comparing a Datsun car with a horse And obviously do not appreciate this album here White Eagle as it is for what it is. Is is not Electronic Meditation and not Phaedra and never intended to be. It is of an entirely different register.

White Eagle is any North Amerindian Chief you can imagine it is also a channeled entity which is followed by many around the world. I have no idea whether Edgar Froese was aware of that and I do not intend to research that; it is irrelevant. The music speaks for itself which is powerful. I repeat once again all three iterations of Tangerine Dream are unbelievably brilliant they are the Pink Floyd of Germany. That level. Maybe by the 1990s they got a little formulaic and some of the albums were almost cut-and-paste productions but by 1982 nothing like that; it was pure liquid gold for which I am eternally grateful to Edgar and his men

Highly recommended and yes very much of its time : 1982

PS: Not always sure folks know that Tangerine here is a reference to the city of Tangiers and not the fruit .... took me years 🙂 🤣😎 to glimpse that ... Tangiers synonymous with kif of course ...