We meet the historic German formation, in the renewed three-piece composition with Thorsten Quaeschning, Hoshiko Yamane and Paul Frick, close to the concert scheduled for July 4th at the Teatro Dal Verme in Milan, as part of the “Worm Up!” festival, born from a new collaboration between Ponderosa Music and Art and I Pomeriggi Musicali. The speaker is frontman Thorsten Quaeschning, who has taken up the baton as leader of the legendary cosmic band from Berlin, after the death in 2015 of the founder and deus ex machina: the unforgettable and unrivaled Edgar Froese.
How did the dream of continuing the journey of Tangerine Dream come about?
After Edgar's sad passing, it was not easy at all to figure out what to do. Edgar had precise plans for every single scenario, he had an extraordinary option for everything. His goal was that the idea and concept behind Tangerine Dream could be stronger than the people and musicians involved. So we could not help but try to carry on his wonderful dream, his vision, by composing a lot of music right away.
How was your relationship?
I remember we played two months before he passed away, on a short tour in Australia. We were at peace and in agreement about everything. In the summer of 2014 there was a kind of change in the concept Tangerine Dream's basics. We took out the percussionists, guitarist and saxophonist and just focused on the sequencer-driven electronic music, which was probably the heart of the engineering behind the project.
A return to the origins…
I remember that during that period he guided me in everything. One day, while I was composing, at a certain point he told me to let it go. That if I wasn't convinced, I certainly couldn't force it. The problem is that I was superimposing a hundred sounds on a single score. In short, I certainly wasn't obliged to follow that path. Edgar told me that everyone learns and can improve day by day and find their own way. So I hope that what we propose today is a little better than what I had in mind seven years ago (smiles, ed.).
Your scores often start slowly and then build up to create a sort of celestial fluctuation. Can we say that in some way this drift is also a metaphor for life and the swing of emotions that follow one another every day?
Thank you so much. It's a great compliment after all. Great question. Of course, the best way to compose is to have a concept and an idea before the melodies take shape in your mind. I think the main problem is how many days they spend with a certain music in their head. It's something we often talk about in the band.
In what sense?
If you feel melodies inside you, it can happen that they actually improve over time, for example if you let them settle for a few days. But then you have to decide when the time has come to record them. And then the questions begin. Like: “Well, maybe, if I had left it in my head two more days, it would have been better by now. But the fear of forgetting some detail is stronger in the end and sometimes it wins. Also, I always hope that the result is not very esoteric or elusive.
When will the new album arrive?
It's ready now and I hope it's the final version. There's always the waiting time related to the label and so on. It could be published already next year, in spring or summer.
You are guests at Worm Up! in Milan. What will you play?
Normally we don't think about it much. First of all we aim to have fun. We will take something from the period that goes from 1974 to 1986, so to “Green Desert”, and then we will replace some parts with the music composed in 2017. Normally we skip the 90s because they don't follow our personal tastes and our current ideas. So in concert we mostly let ourselves be transported by the 70s and the first half of the 80s. Usually we play for two hours and a little more. We also often play a session that is something halfway between improvisation and pre-established. It's nice to improvise, but up to a certain point, also because we have so many rules to follow. What we play live I prefer to call a real-time dialogue, that is, we agree on the tempo and on a main motif and we start playing with the sequences. Or at least we try.
What is your relationship with the audience when you play?
For us, the audience defines a state of mind that is then connected to the space at that particular moment. If the audience reacts in some way to our sounds, it will certainly have an impact on the music, creating a sort of collective resonance. It has happened many times. The Italian audience is an experience apart, as demonstrated by what happened last year for example. It is usually a mixed audience of young and old. And they interact differently with us, especially if I think about what we feel on average with the German audience, where people sometimes seem to return a photo taken from the stage. In short, they do not move at all. Of course, we often play in opera houses or universities, so it is not easy for that to happen. But in Italy, regardless of everything and the context, there is much more energy and I like this a lot. There is a feedback from the very important public. An unprecedented harmony that inspires.
And Italian music?
I love your folk music so much. It's just amazing.
Two adjectives to describe the sound and art of Hoshiko Yamane and Paul Frick.
Interesting. Well, for Paul, if I had to translate it into a musical term, I would say staccato. He plays very rhythmic and at the same time very short notes, and he does it with incredible timing. So, yes: Paul is staccato. While Hoshiko I would say “simply” that she has good taste, because sometimes she stays in the background and it is difficult to recognize what she is playing. She also uses a lot of effects. And if we think about all the effects there are for guitars, we can say that she has a world of her own at her disposal. Hoshiko practically has a guitar pedal company. As a result, she can transform a guitar into a mellotron or a synthesizer at any time. These pedals also work much better if connected to her violin. With her, a choir can sound like a mellotron. So it is difficult for the audience to see and understand what exactly she is doing with her equipment. Many people ask: is it a string quartet or an orchestra? I think that is wonderful.
An album that changed your life.
It's very difficult to choose one. Generally, I would say “Zeit” by Tangerine Dream, because it sounds very different from anything that came before. Otherwise “Ágætis Byrjun” by Sigur Rós. But if I had to choose one, I would say “Selling England by the Pound” by Genesis because for me it's the best progressive songwriting ever made. It has really great riffs. It's very English music, so they didn't try to copy anything else. No, okay, maybe King Crimson, even though Genesis didn't use any blue note in that album.
(04/07/2024)
Antonio Santini for SANREMO.FM