Recorded in 1973 but only released in the mid eighties 'Green Desert' is an example of Tangerine Dream at their best. A much darker and moodier album than usual

Miles better than any of the plinky plonly bontempi stuff they've been releasing for the past 10 years.

The title track is bleak, dark, expansive, and doesn't appear to have dated since '73. It builds up for about 20 minutes - acoustic drumming, weird percussion and ambient synths yet still manages to remain musical (unlike Journey through a burning brain). The guitar solo is the icing on the cake. Classic.

Along with Phaedra and a couple of other albums, this is Tangerine Dream's finest work.

I can safely say that I am a Tangerine Dream fanatic, especially all the stuff up to Force Majeur, and in particular, "Phaedra" and "Rubycon." So of course when I heard that this was a lost album, that fit between "Atem" and "Phaedra," I had to check it out.

As some have mentioned, it is rather frustrating to know that Froese doctored this up a little in 1984, at a time when TD was moving a bit away from their trance inducing electronic music. Therefore, we really will never know what this album sounded like originally. To add further disappointment, the cover art is probably the lamest that I've ever seen from TD. With some of their other albums, you had to ask yourself, "what on earth is that?" But with this, it just seems stupid, because with the other albums, with their mysterious art, the music and the art reflected one another quite nicely. But okay, that's not why I took a star off.

The music on here is pretty different from the first four albums, and it has little to do with the direction they were heading on "Phaedra." At times, it seems a little inconsistent, but you should expect the unexpected with TD! The first track starts off with pulsing keyboards, played very slowly, before building up to an interesting combination of drums and simple guitar riffs. This definately has a great feel to it, and it's very soothing.

"White Clouds" follows, and for some reason I just don't like this song too much. It's got more drumming, which seems a little too percussive and rhthym based for this period of their career. Not terrible by any means, but certainly not their greatest.

The third song is great, even if it really sounds like 80's TD. A simple synth riff played over and over with a few flourishes of old school synth. It actually reminds me a lot more of Klaus Schulze's "Timewind" or "Moondawn" albums. The only thing is that it is only 7 minutes long (this is TD we're talking about, so I want REEEEEAAAAALY long songs!).

The last track is a lot like the first--long and soothing. I can't recall too much from it, but it works very well.

So there you have it. TD surely produced a lot of better music than this, but this is a really strange gem amoung their early work. You can definately tell that since it doesn't fit too well between "Atem" and "Phaedra," they didn't release it at the time. TD lovers MUST have this album, but I don't think that it's a great way to test the waters of this fantastic electronic band. Instead, check out "Phaedra" or "Stratosfear" and go from there.

This album was mixed from long forgotten tapes of Edgar Froese and Chris Frank's aborted 1973 album, without Peter Bauman who had split for a bit. But Peter returned and they scraped this stuff in favour of an album with him. In 1984 Froese remixed and added in a ton of new material that really throws this out of wack with the rest of the T.D. catalogue. To pass this off as a long lost 1973 album is a complete sham. HOWEVER it does hold some merit with its flowing passages and moments of 1973 do appear here and there but they are quickly mixed in with 1984 T.D. sound. It fights itself alot but is over all a good but not great album. Think of it as 1984 album and it makes sense.

Originally recorded in 1973 without Peter Baumann (Peter had taken a short break from the band), Green Desert was not released until 1986. The recording was obviously "touched up" and some fillers were added because this album definitely does NOT sound like the TD of the early '70s.

Many fans felt deceived by this album thinking that they were going to hear something more along the lines of Atem, Zeit or Phaedra. This simply was not the case. With the 1986-era updates, or quite possibly BECAUSE of them, Green Desert stands alone as an excellent example of Tangerine Dreams's creativity and musicianship.

The title track is an ominous and downright spooky affair that could have served as the soundtrack to a top-grade horror film. Gradually, the spookiness is dampened by synth washes and Edgar's technically and artistically perfect guitar. Eventually, Chris Franke adds drums and the pace builds and builds to a feverish pace and then climaxes with more synth washes, only these are a bit lighter and brighter than the track's earlier musings.

Astral Voyager is a testament to Chris Franke's prowess with a sequencer which is overlayed with light and airy synth voices that make the fast-paced track seem a bit more atmospheric.

All in all, Green Desert should be taken for what it is; a (brilliant) release from the electronic music pioneers otherwise known as Tangerine Dream. Discard the fact that it was originally recorded in '73, unless you simply cannot stand anything from the band after that period. If you get past that personal roadblock, it's clear what a masterful piece of work this album is.

I'm a hardcore fan, I'm the kind who loves Electronic Meditation, and I totally dislike the Tyger-Roccoon stuff. But sometimes it's nice to listen to a lighter, much lighter side of TD. That's the album for that. This is the album where Franke first experiments with the sequencer, and it shows; but the result is like a minimalist painting. I agree with other reviewers who say that if you are into exploring TD you should start with other albums, a smooth but serious intro is Stratosfear (very aesthetic).