ALBEDO 0.39

I am sure I'm telling you something you already know here, but the album title relfects the proportion of light which the earth reflects back into space, i.e. a bit more than a third. What the album and track titles tell us really is that the theme of this album is space. Vangelis is the sole performer on the album, even being credited with bass, drums and "all other sounds".

After the familiar repetitive tones of "Pulstar", a simple theme which has been used many a time as background music for documentaries etc., we settle into an album of synthesiser explorations which will be entirely familiar to those who have listened to any Vangelis (or indeed Jean Michel Jarre) album.

The theme stays relatively close to Earth for "Freefall" which includes recordings of astronauts talking during a landing on the moon. This leads directly into "Mare Tranquillitatis" (Latin for "Sea of Tranquillity") the location on the moon where the first manned space mission landed. These two brief forays lead into the 8 minute "Main theme", a lively, rather jazz sounding improvisation.

"Alpha", which sees the music moving into more symphonic territory, is a gradually evolving repeated theme, where the synthesisers build the sound almost imperceptibly towards a fanfare like crescendo. The piece, while essentially quite commercial, is undoubtedly one of the highlights of the album.

The two part "Nucleogensis", whose two parts run to over 12 minutes, is a more complex composition which moves from majestic church organ, through a fast largely improvised synthesiser section with a repetitive trance beat, to a slower climax. Disappointingly though, the track has faded ending.

The final (title) track is primarily a spoken rendition of an array of space and time related statistics, such as there are just over 365 days in a year. Admittedly, there are a few I did not know!

In all, a fine album of synthesiser music which is generally accessible, while containing some more demanding pieces for the devotee of the genre.

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