I stumbled onto the review section here for the first time while ordering my fourth copy of this CD (my wife and I destroy any CD that we actually play). I heard this soundtrack in a Nebraska record store in 1984 when the newly-formed HBO Pictures was trying to promo a tremendously unsuccessful movie debut. The impulse-purchase cassette introduced me to both the film and to TD. The film, an ambient mystery/suspense flick starring Treat Williams and Kris Kristofferson, is a must-see for TD fans and for conspiracy buffs, and its desert scenery formed a marvelous backdrop for the TD tunes. I won't bother telling anyone reading a TD review on this website about TD's music in general.

This soundtrack is similar to a number of TD pieces I like from the mid-70s to the mid-80s: Hyperborea, Exit, Risky Business Soundtrack, Thief Soundtrack, et al. It postdates a lot of the drifting psychedelia that some hardcore TD fans may consider the real deal, but that's a little inaccessible for people like me who just stumbled into the genre. It definitely predates the band's slide into elevator music later in the same decade. (There are probably those who differ with that assessment too, and for those people I've got copies of Canyon Dreams, Private Music of TD, etc. which are theirs for the shipping.) The tracks are short by TD album standards - 3-4 minutes - and package TD ambience into pop-sized structures.

I strongly recommend the soundtrack for anyone who enjoyed the albums listed above.

I love Tangerine Dream, but this album is not my favorite. Still worth owning though.

This soundtrack is very average IMO. There are a few good songs but apparently also a few filler tracks. The best songs would be "Going West", "Plane Ride", "Mystery Tracks" & "Lost in the Dunes". Those songs makes this album worth buying if you are fanatic about Tangerine Dream.

The rest of the tracks are a bit odd if I should call it that way. It's definetely not the kind of TD tracks you sit down and listen too and think "Hey, this song is actually great".

There are too many forgettable tracks that doesn't appeal to my ears and makes me not want to listen to this album too many times when I see it in my collection. But if you are serious about collecting TD's soundtracks then I must say it's well worth picking up at any price (just for the few good songs there are) as it's getting very hard to get your hands on a copy in good condition these days.

A good score, but not among their best! Try before buy!

Much of Tangerine Dreams music is or borders on boring. I don't get it really....

This is not the case with this particular CD. I can remember particular movie scenes, vignettes, details, actors with each track--isn't this what a great soundtrack should do?

My favorite track is number five, "Lost in the Dunes", I can picture one crossing the desert floor, traversing the washes of sand at breakneck speed...then track six fades in....

Watch the movie buy the soundtrack it is this simple.

Here's another of those early 80s soundtracks that the Franke , Froese, Schmoelling line-up of TD seemed to throw out at a frenetic rate. "Flashpoint" dates from 1984 and is in and around the period that TD also produced some of their finest works; "Poland" being the culmination of that period to my mind.

Many of the tracks borrow extensively from TD of those years. The heavy syn-drum sequencing and eastern flavoured synth pads used on "Going West" and "Lost In The Dunes" seem to stem from "Horizon" on "Poland" and "No Man's Land" from "Hyperborea". "Highway Patrol" is a reworking of the latter part of "Sphinx Lightning" (also on "Hyperborea"), but is sufficiently different to remain enjoyable.

Indeed this album reminds me of live TD; taking album themes and reworking them into new pieces.

"LoveFantasy" has that wonderful solo instrument heard on "Barbakane" (I think)! from "Poland" and is a nicely worked and emotive composition. "Mystery Tracks" is the only weakish track here; it sounds very much like one of the tracks from "Le Parc", albeit in a less finished form.

"Dirty Cross Roads" is very 70s style TD; similar in brooding presence to some of the work on "Encore", (I'm thinking of "Desert Dream" in particular). I could live without the Gem's track, "Flashpoint" at the end as it ruins the effect of the rest of the album, but maybe someone wanted a single release?

To conclude then: another fine album with some great tracks, all the more remarkable for the sheer quantity of music TD were putting out at this stage.