Really-From: Doreen Williams 


 Well seems I was feeling incredibly bored I decided to type out the
whole TD interview which was broadcast on Radio Derby this year!.I sent
bits of the interview yesterday but I have now added the other parts,I
hope there is a few people on the list that havn't seen it(Or I have just
wasted 40mins of my time:). 



 AF(Interviewer): Edgar.Jerome welcome to England and welcome to
"Soundscapes" here on BBC Radio Derby, This I am sorry to say is about
the only programme on UK radio that plays your stuff on a regular basis
and I do feel the fact your music isn't seen as "radio friendly" is
actually more the fault of radio than it is yourselves and when you look
your albums sales theres no question that you do merit more airplay?.




 EF: What a shame! Uum! (sounds of muffled laughter).






 AF: I mean that for the most part you do rely on concerts word of mouth
and really I suppose the loyalty of your fan base don't you?.





 EF: Thats more or less the case. You know it depends which places you
go to. So for instance in America it's on a regular basis so that we get
pretty well played on radio but you've got a different situation over
there anyway. But's it true what you've said and various countries you
know they havn't got special radio programmes for that kind of
instrumental music.



 AF: Radio's never been very keen on instrumental music though has it?.



 
 EF: Except a few times. You know when you had big hits on film
soundtracks or whatever. It's true it's very rare - it's a bit like
good jazz it's just played at nightime.
 


 AF: You live and and work in America now-how has America influenced
your sound?.



  
 EF: Not so much the sound - its maybe a bit more the surrounding which
gives you a couple of kicks to get into a composing procedure lifestyle
and social environment but we just live a part of the year over there-
we still have studios over there and vienna and berlin so we try to work
our stuff out in a very cosmopolian way.


 
 AF: I think you're bigger in America than you've ever been at the
moment aren't you?. 
 


 
 EF: That's correct yes. 



 AF: You do sound more rock-orientated - did that just occour naturally
or was that a conscious attempt on your part to make yourselves more
popular in America?.
 

 
 EF: It occurred naturally because if you move away a bit from just the
automatic computerised stuff that we did. like sequencers for years and
years and years. and if you feel very open to any kind of naural
instruments which we did at the same time but didn't use it that much -
so now we've brought in guitars very heavly and saxophones and even
other instruments which we frequently ask people to bring in and play
during our sessions. At this stage we still feel very contemporary in
whatever we do.
 


 AF: Edgar. Tell me what Jerome has brought to Tangerine Dream sinced he
joined you?. 


  
 EF: Fresh Air! (sounds of laughter).


 
 
 AF: In what sense?.
 

 
 

 EF: You see what you have. to cut that off right away from the very
beginning is not the usual sort of father/son relationship it's sort of
an ongoing procedure between two muscians who respect and like each
other and we are partners on every leval of business and music snd so in
most cases we do trust each other and respect each other and therefore
it's very good to work with him - and he is accidentally my son but in
the first place he is a good colleague.
 
 
 AF: Jerome. I presume you grew up with your fathers music so that it
really became a part of your life didn't it?.
 
 
  
 
 JF: Yeah it it did Yeah I mean when I was born Tangerine Dream was just
founded so I went to every concert and I travelled with the group so I
suppose you could say that I was a very early member of the band.
 
 
  
 
 AF: You were(laughter) did your father always encourage you to play
keyboards or was that a decision that you made?.

 
  
 JF: Oh no no that was my decision I mean synthesizers were all around
me my whole life so it was inevitable that I tried  to play on them.
 

 
 AF: And did you take to the instruments quite naturally?.


 

 JF: Yeah I think so Yeah.
 
 


 AF: Well I've got to say looking at your latest album I wasn't at all
happy with "Turn Of The Tides" thats the album that came before this new
one "Tyranny Of Beauty" because I think that it's a supreme improvement
I mean how do you feel about the new album?.


 
 EF: The major difference as far as our production was concerned between
Turn" and "Tyranny" was that we spent about three quarters of a year
producing "Turn Of The Tides" and we spent about three months producing
Tyranny Of Beauty" so whether or not it had a big influence the matter of
fact is that "Tyranny" is a much more direct album it's a bit more I would
say "rough" in terms of the way we produced it and set in all the guitar
work and we wanted to make it a bit more rock orientated.
 



 JF Yeah it's more emotional than technical you know.
 

 
 AF: Yes I think so. Are you saying almost that you spent perhaps too much
time on "turn Of The Tides" and it's got a rather over-produced sort of
feel?.
 
 
  
 EF: You are correct that's what we felt afterwards.

 
  
 

 AF: Did you actually decide that you were going to make this new album
in a much shorter space of time?.
 

   
 EF: We had to! (laughter) It's funny that a lot of things in our career
and maybe quite a few of our colleagues who hear this will agree. a lot
of things in anybody's career will happen coincidentlly or by accident
or by you know by surprise. We had to move in because we had to move out
again quite early and we had other obligations to follow and so we just
had about three months to do it Therefore quite a few things that we
would have stacked in regularly just had to be cut off.

  
 
 AF: So the pressure helped really?.



 
 EF: Somehow yes. You know. There are a few people around who need about
two or three years to produce a record. Tangerine Dream always has been
a band who need pressure and some of the best piecees of music we've
done have been produced in one afternoon.

 
 

 AF: I do love the opening track in particular. "Catwalk" - was that an
intention of yours to produce music for the Catwalk?.




 EF: You see it's a bit asoociated with what the album is all about -
it's about the beauty in the so-called social enviroment- the way the
people are treated to become very beautiful or beautiful enough to be
part of a certain society and to have the advantages when they become
part of this group of "beautiful people" and the entire thing of selling
things or trying to look around to get the best possible item -
everything has something to do with the beauty and the cover of a thing
becomes more important than whats in the box. So thats the whole idea
behind it and "Catwalk" is in fact written for catwalks. that is true
and maybe on a tour we will perform it that way - that would be a funny
thing anyway!! (Laughter).




 AF: So we are going to see some fashion models walk in front of you as
you play?.
 


 EF: (Still laughing) Yes.yes I don't know what we will do - maybe put
on some leather clothes and run up and down or stuff - I don't know.
 


 AF: Model the clothes yourself?.




 EF: Modeling yes!!




 AF: Lets use that track. Maybe as an example to show how you and Jerome
work together - I mean you both write for the band and for the most part
you do write together. So how do the two of you combine?.




 EF: Jerome is a better percussionist and because he started his music
career as a drummer he is laying down most of the rythem tracks
sometimes starting with the bass and then I very often get in with
chords and stuff. Sometimes he is doing most of the basic work just
himself - I add some melodies or he is completing an entire piece just
by himself or we do it the other way round so I mean we just take the
best part of each of us and then glue it together!. 





 AF: Interestingly you have re-worked an old tune "stratosfear" was it
going back to work on the old material for the "Tangents" compilation
that led you to this new version?.
 
 
 

 JF: When we did the "Tangents" compilation I made the "Stratosfear"
remix as a bonus track just for the "Tangents" album and when we sent
the tapes to Virgin they said OK it's quite good but the "Stratosfear"
doesn't fit with the other stuff on the records so it's maybe not the
best piece to put on the "tangents" album. We still thought that it was
a good track so we thought we would maybe put it on the next studio
album which we did.
 
  
 
 AF: Edgar. how did you feel about those early albums like "stratosfear"
on Virgin when you went back to remix and re-record all those tracks for
the "Tangents" compilation?.
 
 
 
 EF: Hard procedure. Hard work because one would think that you would
just go in and remix it or you remaster things or you do some
overdubbing because some of the pieces had to be cut to become shorter
for the compilation and so you had to move in with some excellent music
and move out with some excellent music as well. You had to move in very
deeply into the body of each single piece. and you had. at the same
time to move into the period of time when you did the recording and all
of a sudden to my surprise I was in the middle of the 70s because I had
to catch up with the emotional side of it and I had all the memories of
what happened between the three off of us at that period of time and how
it was and business things came up and it's so funny how music ca
trigger your human memory. Thats not always a very comfortable procedure
in terms of going back and watching from inside again events from that
period of time.
  


 AF: You say it was hard work remixing and re-recording all those tracks
but would you say it was a labour of love as well?.
 



 EF: It's kind of a labour of love because I was part of the band at
that period of time and there was part of myself already in the music.
You know that you can accept yourself and you can respect yourself as
what you are. On the other hand your consciouness has changed and you as
a person and your personality has changed from all those years. If you
havn't heard the stuff for many years all of a sudden you are in
confronatation with part of yourself and so thats a funny process - I
didn't know that it would be so complicated.
 
  
 

 AF: I'll always remember the first time I heard your music on John
Peel's show - he played your first Virgin album "Phaedra" and music was
never quite the same for me again after that. I mean it was a really
groundbreaking release because it was the first successful electronic
music album in this country.What do you remember of that particular
time?.
  
 
 
 EF: It's good that you mention John because whenever I am in the world
I try to give him a credit and I do it here again. Without John Peel we
would not have made it here in Britain or anywhere in the world because
he was the one who played us heavily a record called "Atem" many years
years back on BBC 1 and so he was the guy who actually brought us not
just into international music scene but but into the business as well. 
He is still around and I am happy about that and whenever I can I listen
to him. That was a time when we really could take off because other
countries did not want to listen to it so the fact the UK was the only
part of the world who really wanted to listen to that kind of music and
all of a sudden because of the success that we had over here things
started spreading out all over the place.

 
  
 AF: So the UK and John Peel were very crucial to the success of
"Tangerine Dream"?.
 

   
   
 EF: It was the key point,it was the starting line for all and
everything.  
 
 


 AF: And great credit to John Peel because your music was at the time
was very brave. Certainly brave for the time because it was so
experimental!.




 EF: Thats true.

 
 


 Af: And it was also a time of course when electronic keyboards were very
bulky and really quite limited. You were playing things like VCS 3's
Moogs and Mellotrons. Have you ever thought of going back to reproduce
that sound and playing long improvised pieces once more?.
 
  
 
 EF: We definitly will do. You see we started out in 1970 with a concept
and that concept is now somewhat closed with "Tyranny Of Beauty" so we
went from being 150% improvising band to a 150% composing songs or
instrumental pieces band. So now that cycle has closed and now we will
move in a different direction which will include something which could
be called improvisation but it will have a different level of approach.

 


 
 AF: Right. While you were working on "Tangents" was there any one album
you returned to and thought "Um that was a good one" did one have a
particular impression on you?.
 


 EF: You see the thing is that up to now including soundtracks we have
about 52 records on the market,it's like having 52 kids you know which
one you find ugly which one is the best which one is the one you want to
carry on your life with. They are all there. We always say in our music
that it is nothing more nothing less than a diary and follow it through
all the years. It's part of yoyr life it's part of those peoples life
who carried on with us and could identify themselves with what we wanted
to do and wanted to say. 




 AF: You were asked to list your top tracks for the "Tangnets"
compilation and you actually put "Phaedra" at number 1.





 EF: Yeah thats true because it was not just the fact that we had a
chance to record in Britain for the first time through Virgin records
but it was also the situation that we had over there in Oxford. We went
into a studio near Oxford and there was such an amazing atmosphere and it
was such incredible surroundings you know. Being in the studio for a
couple of weeks getting paid having the most advanced instruments on
hand and just sitting there and doing what we wanted to do and no-one
rushed into the room and said "Hey. wait a minute thats not commercial
enough"!. Even if we went on on a different direction later on from
Virgin to other companies that was the key point and I still thank the
company very much for what they did at a very early stage in our career.





 
 AF: Let me turn to Jerome here. Jerome have you got a favorite
Tangerine Dream album on Virgin or maybe a single track?
 
 
 
  

 JF: My favorite albums from the Virgin catalogue started with "Force
Majure" and albums from around that time - I am not a fan of the old
stuff like "Atem" I also don't like "Phaedra" or "Rubycon" very much.It's
not my time you know I'm more into the newer stuff. I also like "Exit"
very much and also the newer stuff like "Live Miles" although that is
not virgin anymore! I would say that "Force Majure" and "Exit" are my
personal favorite records.
 
 
 
 

 AF: Edgar. You are quoated as saying how ridiculed you were by the
press when you said in 1974 that everyone would be using synthesizers on
stage and you were proved right - what's also happened is that since the
mid 80s we have in this country growing ambient scene and I know Jean
Michel Jarre's publicists have been calling him the "Godfather of
Ambience" some say it was Kraftwerk others say it was Klaus Schulze I
think Tangerine Dream's influence was the greater.
 
 

 
 EF: I personally would say that Mr Jarre. Mr Schulze the Kraftwerk
people and a thousand others can share their piece of "Godfather"
themselves - I don't want to be part of it to be honest! (laughter) I
don't want to call myself a godfather. For me it has a different
meaning. But on the other hand it is certainly true that a lot of people
all of a sudden rushed into the synthesizer business and tried to do
what they can do. When I look at the British scene we know those guys
like Aphex Twin, Orbital, and Future Sound Of London(I like them a lot)
-that and some others is music that can be produced today. It could not
have been produced ten years ago I would say.We might have been part of
things in the early years but if you think about playing an instrument
today who can sit arounf and wait for 10 or 15 years before he can play
professionally at piano. I mean that time unfortuntely I have to say has
gone. So all the youngsters want to rush out get an insrtumenthook it up
and just become superstar and make their living from it,maybe its the
wrong approach but what can you do - it's the spirit of the time.




 AF: You mention the Orb,Aphex Twin and Future Sound Of London. Are you
aware of the more traditional electronic music scene in this country.
I'm talking about musicians like Mark Shrreeve.John Dyson and most
recently people like Andy Pickford and Node?.
 
 


 EF: I know them all yeah. 




 AF: You do?.
 



 EF: From their music but Mark Shreeve I know as he was part of our
career when he was on the same record label Zomba/Jive. I would say that
what we need is what are doing right now. We need radio time because
that's a more important factor. with our kind of music you can't go on
MTV you can't go VH1 in America so it's very hard with concerts it's
very hard to book a tour because people are very unsure as to what the
sales will be and so on. So the only focus point where could trust
someone to get people together is the radio.




 AF: Lets return to "Tyranny Of Beauty" - you don't often perform other
peoples tunes but your version I think of Handels Largo works extremely
well,What led you to record that?.




 
 EF: The thing is I'm very fasinated by by handels time in London. Some
people may know that he spent quite a big portion of his lifetime in
London playing for kings and queens amd so on and he had a mass output
of music which has a typical British atmosphere - thats what it sounds
like to us. Apart from that we always try to give remarkable credit to
those people who somehow have guided all of us into a new direction of
music. I have heard an interview with in which Jack Bruce the former
Cream guiterist and one of the best bass players on this planet I guess.
he would recall Bach as the best bass player of all time so you can
learn from those classical composers: for instance if you do
arrangements  and listen to Mozart's music you know what what a real
genius arrangement is. so learn from these people and then filter it
through your own human system and make a new kind of music.





 AF: You have a permanet guitarist now I see and Linda Spa your
saxophonist and flautist is also a permanent band member I believe. I
understand you'll be touring together later this year in this country is
that right?.



 
 EF: Not later in this year. We are starting later in this year the
American leg of a world-wide tour moving over to South America and we'll
be in Europe by March/April so at the moment it looks like we could hit
Britain by about mid April next year.



 AF: So we've got to wait nearly a year?.




 EF: Just a bit less (laughter). 




 AF: Edgar. I'm sure there are many Tangerine Dream fans listening and I
meet a lot who say to me "you know I would love to hear Tangerine Dream
as they were in the 70s and 80s" and I know there are some people who
are not keen on the 90s sound.I mean what would you say to those
people?.



 EF: Er. nothing less thsn the music is like a growing kid and if you
have ever had a kid and the fid grows and becomes 25 or 30 you can't sit
there and say "Hey,you were such a nice kid when you were 5 or 10 but
now such a big strange body" so you see things are changing and as long
as things are changing they progress and things can always turn out to
be a surprise and it can be an adventure for those people who are
creating and composing music. People should respect movements within the
artists. It doesn't matter if you are a writer a painter or a musician.
I cannot agree with those who would say that you must be confined in
your work or that you must stay for ever in the style of what you became
famous or very popular for. To those people we could say if you still
have some money buy the re-masters available on Cd. they are more or
less original or listen to some tapes but please please don't force us
to step back into a time we've passed already and we all have passed
that.






 AF: Your quoted as saying "Tangerine Dream is your own Dream" what do
you mean by that?.






 EF: I believe that all of us all human beings on this planet have one
dream in common and that everyone is searching for something but maybe
we don't know what it is. Some people may find it sometimes in their
lives. Some others won't but that's the thing which binds all of us and
that's a dream for something which we can't explain. A lot of people
we've met over the years all over the globe feel somehow like a stranger
on earth like sitting on a long train moving into a wrong station and
feeling that they are getting lost somewhere and thats the feel of the
music and a lot of people can identify with what we want to say through
muxic. Everybody should start from there in trying to find his own way
out.  




 AF: Well Eddgar Jerome it's been a real pleasure speaking with you.
We've already played a couple of tracks from "Tyranny" "Catwalk" and
"Largo". Could I ask you to select a track that you think worked
particulary well on that album?.




 EF: We both, speaking for Jerome here  and myself like "The Little
Blonde" because it has s special meaning - "The Little Blonde In The Park
Of Attractions"





 AF: Lovely. OK we'll play that and wish you all the best in your future
career and hope to see you within the year here in Britain playing some
more concerts,thank you very much.



 
 EF & JF: OK thank you. bye-bye!




 Well there you are the whole interview typed out, I hope you all
appriciate it!