Tangerine Dream - Brussels 1976 (1976)

In 1976 Tangerine Dream went back into the studio to record the follow-up to 'Richocet', and so with a new studio album to promote in 'Stratosfear' they embarked on a European tour, taking in Germany, France, the UK, Spain and Belgium, with the band performing live in Brussels on 09 February 1976. Part of this concert had been available on the bootleg CD 'Danger Live' since 1992, but the Tangerine Tree project managed to improve on this version, which now features the complete 99 minutes of the gig, and which was remastered directly from a first generation tape. This release also includes the last missing 20 seconds of the second track and the first few seconds of the encore. Both were not present on the first generation tape, but thanks to a member of the tadream discussion list (who had also recorded the show back in 1976) it was possible to patch in the gaps. The sound quality is great considering that it is an audience recording from 1976, and the music is a perfect mix of sequencers, mellotron and guitar – one of the highlights from that year.

Track listing

01 Part One
02 Part Two
03 Encore

Tangerine Dream - Orange 75 (1975)

1975 saw the release of one of my favourite TD albums, 'Richocet', and although it wasn't really marketed as a live album, it consisted of two side-long compositions mixed from studio recordings, and the UK portion of their August–October 1975 European Tour. Not surprisingly, recordings from this tour make up a large number of my bootlegs, and they were so popular at this time that film director Tony Palmer filmed their concert at Coventry Cathedral, and it was released on DVD in 2013. There is also an excellent recording from the tour when they visited Fairfield Halls In Croydon, plus some of slightly lesser quality at Glasgow and Manchester, and at Liverpool Cathedral and York Minster. For this post I've gone with  'Orange 75', which is a recording of their appearance at the Orange Festival (also known as Orange 75), which was a three-day music festival held on 15-17 August 1975 at the Roman Theatre in Orange, France. At the time it was promoted as the 'French Woodstock', and included a stellar line-up, including Bad Company, Fairport Convention, Procol Harum, Dr Feelgood, Wishbone Ash, Mahavishnu Orchestra, Soft Machine, Caravan and Climax Blues Band. Tangerine Dream played on the second day as special guests, and the music is what you would expect if you'd just bought 'Richocet'. I've made my own cover art for this one based on the actual programme which could be purchased at the festival, as it makes it just a bit more unique than using the generic Tangerine Tree cover. 

Track listing

01 Part I
02 Part II

Tangerine Dream - Kelvin Hall, Glasgow (1974)

1974 was an extremely successful year for Tangerine Dream, and they played some outstanding shows. They embarked on their first tour of the United Kingdom, performing twenty concerts across the country in less than seven weeks. Just how popular they were was revealed with the release of the 'In Search Of Hades' box set a few years ago, which included complete recordings of their concerts at The Rainbow Theatre and Victoria Palace, both in London, while their performance at Reims Cathedral in France was a highlight of their career, even if it did earn them a lifetime ban from ever performing in a Catholic church again. It was such an iconic performance that it was included in 'The Official Bootleg Series Volume One' in 2015, and Cherry Red officially released the tapes as recently as 2021 as a 2xLP set, although true fans had owned Tangerine Tree Volume 30 for many years already. Another fine recording from this year was the one on 29 October at Sheffield City Hall, and this was in fact included on 'The Bootleg Box Set Vol. 1' in 2003. The band found themselves in Glasgow on the 20th November for a concert at the Kelvin Hall, a venue which had previously played host to everything from musicians to boxers to a circus, and the concert was captured by local station Radio Clyde for later broadcast. Only a single 1/4" tape reel from this recording is known to have survived, being the last of three which are alleged to have contained the entire performance. Despite being nearly half a century old, this reel had been kept in excellent condition and was professionally transferred to digital and then remastered. While the full concert is available as a Tangerine Leaves release, their own notes admit that while the disc might feature the complete recording, the sound quality is mediocre only, or maybe worse, especially on the first disc. For this post I've therefore used the partial recording from Radio Clyde, which might only contain two thirds of the full gig, but the sound quality is pristine. 

Track listing

01 Septrional Remnant
02 Analog Ascent

Tangerine Dream - Saint Ouen, France (1973)

1973 was a transitional period for Tangerine Dream, as they'd moved to the UK after signing a deal with Virgin Records, and were recording their first album for the label at Virgin's famous Manor Studios in November and December of 1973. The result was to be 'Phaedra', and it was a distinct progression from their previous two albums for the German Ohr Label, 'Zeit' and 'Atem'. Their concerts from early 1973 were still featuring the cosmic space-rock of those records, and one gig from Berlin was included on the Esoteric re-release of 'Atem'. There don't seem to have been many recordings made of their concerts during 1973, with Tangerine Tree only having three, of which one is the afore-mentioned Berlin show, which has now been officially released. The best officially unreleased recording from this period is the one from 20 November 1973 at The Alhambra Theatre, in Saint Ouen, France, so that's the one I'm using for this post. It's not perfect quality, and so is part of the Tangerine Leaves arm of the project, but it sounds pretty good to me as a time-capsule of what the band sounded like on stage at exactly the same time that they were recording 'Phaedra' at the Manor Studios.

Track listing

01 Part One
02 Part Two 

Tangerine Dream - Klangwald (1972)

Sky Arts has just broadcast a fascinating documentary about Tangerine Dream entitled 'Revolution Of Sound', and it prompted me to dig out some of the many live bootlegs that I have from the band and to give them another listen. Tangerine Dream are a godsend to bootleggers, as the long pieces that that play means that all they have to do is point the mike and press play, and then do nothing until the first piece ends 40 minutes later! The other great thing about their concerts is that because they employ so much improvisation, no two are ever the same, and Wednesday's gig can be totally different to Tuesday's. There are literally hundreds of live bootlegs available on the internet, and the fan project Tangerine Tree has done a superlative job in collecting the very best of them and making them available to a wider audience. The creators of the project received permission from Tangerine Dream to release the collection on a strict non-profit basis, and several volumes have been used as the basis for official releases later on. Material was collected from audience recordings, soundboards, radio and TV transmissions, and in some cases the purchase of studio masters. Only recordings of a high quality and a unique nature were considered for the core volumes, and these were professionally re-mastered and released on CD-R, accompanied by high quality artwork. Tangerine Leaves releases were based on material that did not meet the high quality standards of a Tangerine Tree release, or from concerts that were not considered notable enough, but if a better source was found, a Tangerine Leaves volume might be upgraded to a Tangerine Tree one. My favourite period of the band's history is the period leading up to 'Phaedra' in 1973 through to 'Stratosfear' in 1976, although I do have recordings from a number of later incarnations of the band, as well as some from as early as 1968, but really I love everything that they've done.  
As the actual recordings can sometimes be hard to track down I thought I'd post one recording from each year from 1972 - which foreshadows what would appear on 'Phaedra' a year or so later - to 1976, which is the year before they released the official live double album 'Encore'. For the 1972 concert I've chosen a recording from Cologne, which is a major highlight of the Tangerine Tree fan project, as it presents a totally unknown recording from that year. Originally a mono recording, the music has nothing to do with the already known Cologne gig on 25 November 1972, which exists as an FM radio recording with an announcer, although it is certainly from the same period considering the instruments used. It contains two long tracks, but no-one knows if it was really recorded during that show. In 2011, the main Tangerine Tree organizer reminisced about the recording: "I received this a few years ago from a Belgian collector. I can't even recall his name, or if he was/is part of the tadream list. I got an email in which he offered me a tape from the 'Klangwald' show, and of course, I said 'great!', hoping that he had a superior copy of the show than what was in circulation at that time. As some of you may know I even contacted radio and TV stations and bought pricey master copies for the Tangerine Tree series, but the 'Klangwald' show was unobtainable. You can imagine my surprise when I first heard the cassette (an old one which had 'Klangwald' written on it). Despite an awful amount of tape hiss, it was clear that this was a different recording. I then passed it on to be remastered, and they did the usual excellent job. How the Belgian fan got hold of it I guess we'll never know. Musically it fits right into the late '72/early '73 kind of music that TD was playing, and although I wasn't quite convinced, I labeled the disc as 'Klangwald', knowing that it must have been a pretty long show if you combine it with what we already knew before!" It is quite likely that the origin of this recording is one of those 1972 shows for which no recording is known to exist, but the music is excellent, an improvised cosmic classic that perfectly fits into the 'Zeit' and 'Atem' period. The sound quality is very good, given the age of the recording, and seems to be taken directly from a live soundboard.

Track listing

01 Klangwald 1
02 Klangwald 2

Risky Business - The Business Undone Edition (1983)

Time for another contribution from Mike Solof, and this time he's gone all the way back to 1983 to put together the complete soundtrack to a classic movie, so over to Mike.......

Inspiration struck tonight. I was doing some research and down the YouTube rabbit hole I went to finally drop down into the soundtrack for the 1983 movie 'Risky Business', featuring Tangerine Dream and classic cuts by Bob Seger, Muddy Waters, Prince and Phil Collins to name just a few. In doing my research, I found that 4 songs (by The Talking Heads, The Police, Bruce Springsteen and the Living Strings ) were cut from the Original Soundtrack. As well as that five of the songs that were on the album were shortened edits of their original versions. What made it even worse was that no official score of the entire Tangerine Dream material was ever released. I've therefore put together the ultimate 'Risky Business' soundtrack which Iʼm calling 'Risky Business - The Business Undone Edition'. My version expands the original soundtrack to include all the unedited original songs, including the Tangerine Dream selections, which consist of two new compositions and three reworkings of previously released material from 1979 and 1981, re-titled to correspond to scenes in the movie, plus the four songs left off the released soundtrack. Not only that, I've also included the complete super rare, hard to find and heavily sought-after promotional press kit album. 'Risky Business (The Audio Movie Kit)', which was issued in 1983 on a 17 minute, double vinyl set, with roughly 50 to 100 copies being made and shipped to various radio stations to promote the forthcoming movie. Eight pieces composed by Tangerine Dream were provided for this kit and they can only be found on this album, being different from the material that was used for the official release of the 'Risky Business' soundtrack album in 1984 by Virgin Records. As a final treat I've also included the entire original score of the movie, as performed by Tangerine Dream, with its 26 cuts totaling over 46 minutes of music. 

Track listing for 'Risky Business - The Business Undone Edition'

01 Every Breath You Take (The Police)

02 My Heart Tells Me (The Living Strings)
03 Old Time Rock And Roll (Bob Seger)
04.The Dream is Always the Same (Tangerine Dream - unedited version)
05 Cloudburst Flight (Tangerine Dream - unedited version of 'Guido The Killer Pimp')
06 The Pump (Jeff Beck)
07 Force Majeure (Tangerine Dream - unedited version of 'Lana')
08 Hungry Heart (Bruce Springsteen)
09 Mannish Boy (Muddy Waters)
10 Swamp (Talking Heads)
11 D.M.S.R. (Prince - full version)
12 After the Fall (Journey)
13 In the Air Tonight (Phil Collins)
14 Love On A Real Train (Tangerine Dream - unedited version)

Track listing for the 'Risky Business (The Audio Movie Kit)'

01 No Future (Film Version)
02 Lana (Press Kit Version)
03 Guido The Killer Pimp (Press Kit Version)
04 U Boat Commander 

05 U Boat Commander (Press Kit Version)
06 Catching The Egg
07 Returning The Furniture (Press Kit Version)
08 Love On A Real Train (End Credits)
09 Joel's Dream (The Dream Is Always The Same) (bonus track)
10 Love On A Real Train (Train Sequence) (bonus track)

Track listing  for 'Risky Business - The Full Score' by Tangerine Dream

01 The Dream Is Always The Same 
02 Joel's Dream (The Dream Is Always The Same) 
03 Watering Flowers 
04 Watering Flowers (Tangram Set One) 
05 Wrong Date 
06 No Future (Film Version) 
07 No Future (Get Off The Babysitter)
08 See You Tonight 
09 Lana 
10 Bond Withdrawal 
11 Guido The Killer Pimp (Film Version) 
12 Guido The Killer Pimp (Press Kit Version) 
13 Guido The Killer Pimp (Album Version) 
14 Joel & Lana 
15 Confrontation With Guido 
16 U Boat Commander 
17 U Boat Commander (Press Kit Version) 
18 Love On A Real Train (Film Version) 
19 Love On A Real Train (Album Version) 
20 Love On A Real Train (Train Sequence) 
21 Porsche Ride 
22 Yard Sale 
23 Catching The Egg 
24 Returning The Furniture 
25 Returning The Furniture (Press Kit Version) 
26 Love On A Real Train (End Credits) 

(Tracks 15 and 16 compiled by Anthony Morales and remixed by Andy Morales)

Tangerine Dream - Second Day (1973)

I've now worked my way through the rest of the 'Phaedra' out-takes, and they are even better than my recent post, and certainly deserve to be housed on their own album. I've kept '2nd Day' as the lead track, and mixed '2nd Side piece 1' and '2nd Side piece 2' together for the b-side, and expanded the titles to make a superb 42 minute album. The cover is a painting entitled 'Morning, The Second Day' by Maurice Sapiro, which not only ties in perfectly with the title of the album, but I think also makes a great sleeve. There aren't enough out-takes for any further posts, but to get two complete albums from the leftovers of those recordings sessions is amazing, and I can only recommend this box set again to anyone with even the slightest interest in Tangerine Dream.

Track listing

01 Second Day

02 Second Side

Tangerine Dream - Phaedra & Hippolytus (1973)

The big news for fans of Tangerine Dream is the release of the 18 disc box set of all of their Virgin albums issued between 1973 and 1979. Not only does it include remastered and remixed versions of classic albums like 'Phaedra'. 'Rubycon', and 'Ricochet' ,but it also treats us to the full 70-minute recording of the 1974 lost album 'Oedipus Tyrannus', excerpts of which I posted here back in January. As if that wasn't enough we also get three live albums, from The Rainbow and Victoria Palace in 1974, and The Royal Albert Hall from 1975, all recorded in superb sound quality, and featuring the band at the absolute peak of their powers. Lastly, and most unbelievably of all, there are over one and a half hours of out-takes from the 'Phaedra' sessions at The Manor Studios in 1973. It's almost too much to take in, but I gravitated straight to the 'Phaedra' out-takes, and bearing in mind how TD improvise a lot of their music, these aren't just alternate versions of the finished tracks, but totally different works in progress for the eventual album. I thought they were just too good to leave tucked away as bonus tracks so I decided to take a few of them and make a companion album, and as 'Phaedra' was named after the Greco-Roman tragedy, I've kept that theme and titled this one after the main participants, renaming two tracks to make it a concept album about them. For the actual music I've kept the 20-minute 'Phaedra Out-Take version 2A', used a renamed 'Organ Piece' as a bridge, and then joined 'Phaedra Out-Take 2B' to 'Phaedra Out-Take 1' for the final piece, making a 42-minute alternative album. I'm still working my way through all the live stuff, and will then check out the rest of the out-takes, but I've already ear-marked a couple of them for another alternate album, probably called 'Second Day'. I tried to go for a suitably cosmic feel for the cover, which I think has come out pretty well, and if you are a fan of the band then I would highly recommend this box set, as it's worth it just for all the previously unreleased material on there, let alone the great Steven Wilson remixes of the albums themselves.

Track listing

01 Phaedra
02 Theseus
03 Hippolytus

Tangerine Dream - Oedipus Tyrannus (1974)

Tangerine Dream have probably released more official and unofficial albums that almost any other band, which when you include their sanctioned bootleg releases must run into the hundreds, and yet even they have mythical albums which have never seen the light of day, and 'Oedipus Tyrannus' is one of those. Rumours have abounded for years on the net about an album supposedly recorded some time in 1974 but never released, but no-one could seem to agree on the track listing or what the music sounded like. When I first heard about it I Googled it and found it quite easily, but after playing it and doing further research I found that it was actually a live album recorded in Chichester in 1974, supposedly featuring live versions of some of the tracks, but I wasn't convinced that it was what I was looking for. More investigation was needed, and I finally found someone who seemed to know what they were talking about, who confirmed that parts of an album had been recorded as suspected, and that some of the tracks were accessible in various locations, so you had to piece it together yourself. It's generally agreed that the album consists of three tracks - Overture, Zeus and Baroque, and the first one was surprisingly easy to find as it was actually included on the Virgin Records sampler 'V' in 1975! That just left the other two tracks, which had been professionally recorded at CBS studios, but which had then been rejected by the band. Somehow they made their way to John Peel, who played all three tracks on his radio show as one long piece, and luckily recordings of that are still available. I later found out that the Chichester recording wasn't even a live gig, as it was just the Peel radio broadcast with some other live tracks added to the CD. So by taking the first track from the 'V' sampler and adding the best versions that I could find of the other two tracks from the Peel broadcast, we have all that is available of this legendary album. It's only 23 minutes long, so to make up some time I've added on both sides of their rare 1971 debut 7" single 'Ultima Thule. (Great timing, as we've just received pictures of the planet Ultima Thule from the New Horizons spacecraft.) 

Track listing

01 Overture
02 Zeus
03 Baroque
04 Ultima Thule (Part One)
05 Ultima Thule (Part Two)