Search - Edgar Froese :: Aqua

An exquisite and unforgettable experimental album

Steve Benner | 01/26/2002

(5 out of 5 stars)

""Aqua" is the first solo album of Edgar Froese, the founder of Tangerine Dream, an album recorded in early 1974, on the wave of the band's international success, "Phaedra". The album shows how great Edgar's compositional input was in these ancient times. Sadly, this wasn't so in the 1980s. For this reason, and because of the objective qualities of Aqua, I dare say that this album is a must-have for all Tangerine Dream fans, especially those who love the band's music from the early period - and for those who like good electronic music with an experimental bent. 'Aqua', the long title track, is a long moody suite, which is dream-like, nostalgic, detached. With just organs and early 'analog' synthesizers, Edgar Froese paints musical landscapes which seem to be a journey into the unknown. Captivated, you will be listening to this track over and over again. I claim that there is hardly better music to accompany reading. With a minimal instrumentarium, Edgar Froese was able to deliver so much emotion, so much soul-inspiring content, that it's hard to believe. None of his later albums are as good as this one. This is a masterpiece of electronic music.'NGC891', another long suite, starts with a lovely analog sound imitating the aircraft sound, you know the one; I am sure you have spent endless hours as a kid out there, in the open field, in the forest, in the meadow, inspecting bugs, wonders of nature in complete silence, to suddenly hear this distant roar of a supersonic aircraft, startling you for a second or two. For me, this is the album of impressions from my childhood. Then, after a few minutes, a bubbling basso continuo enters, and the track becomes a fast journey into the clouds of imagination. With Chris Franke's help, Edgar Froese augmented 'NGC891' with a Moog synthesizer bass passage which will set any audiophile of electronic music on their knees. The remaining tracks, 'Upland' and 'Panorphelia' constitute musical experiments much in the vein of the then-recent Tangerine Dream albums, "Atem" and "Phaedra". When I was 8 years old, I visited Stanislaw Ignacy Witkiewicz's museum in southern Poland, where mout-agape, I admired the fantastic experimental pictures of the malign artist. The small museum in a wooden cottage made a long-lasting impression on the young moose, also because the musical background was as mysterious as the paintings themselves. The old tape-player churned out sounds which were fascinating, and since I have always had a penchant for being lost in thoughts, I was mesmerized. I asked the attendant what the music was, and it turned out to be Edgar Froese. Being unable to pronounce the name, I memorized it, and only years later I recalled this adventure. However, "Aqua", since it was this album that I was hearing in the museum, planted a seed in my young soul, fertilized my imagination. Well, I have listened to Tangerine Dream and Edgar Froese all my life and I am happy to have discovered this music so early. Thus, if you are the dreaming type of person, you might enjoy this album as much as I do. if your children are small bookworms, if they have an introvert, introspective nature, perhaps you could play this album to them during evenings, silently in the background, while you read or tell them stories. Trust me, it will be the experience they will never forget."

Superb electronic art music

Jeffrey J.Park | Massachusetts, USA | 12/03/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Recorded largely during the winter of 1973/74 and released in 1974, this masterwork was the first solo effort by Edgar Froese, who just happens to be the motivating force behind the gothic, electronica giant Tangerine Dream. The four pieces on Aqua range from the 6'31" Upland, to the lengthy 16'58" title track Aqua. Musically, this album brings the experimental aspects of Atem (1973) and Phaedra (1974) together with the brooding, grey soundscapes found on Rubycon (1975) to create an excellent work of what is referred to as electronic "art" music. As to be expected, pulsating, throbbing, and bubbling analog synthesizers abound and include the mellotron, along with low-frequency "bass" sequenced parts and melody lines played on one of the synthesizers made by Bob Moog (double moog?) although the exact model is not cited. If I am not mistaken I did hear some sounds that reminded me of a VCS 3 and an ARP Pro Soloist/ARP 2600 although this is not entirely clear (there was only a limited instrument listing). It is worth noting that Chris Franke (also of Tangerine Dream) was featured on the piece NGC 891 where he contributed parts on the moog synthesizer. In addition to synthesizers, there is an organ part on Upland and "found sounds" are present on a few tracks including the sound of flowing water on the opening piece Aqua, in addition to snippets of pre-recorded automobile and airplane sounds on NGC 891. As suggested in the liner notes, I listened to "Side 2 (NGC 891 and Upland) with headphones to fully appreciate the "revolutionary artificial head system" developed by Gunther Brunschen. As translated through an excellent pair of Bose "Triports", I did get the sense of a "3D surround-sound" effect, especially with the airplane and automobile sounds - although there is some "clipping" and distortion, the airplane generally sounded as if it was passing directly overhead, and the automobile sounds were such that it created the (disconcerting) effect of standing in the middle of a road. The last piece Upland closes with a collage of parts played backwards. Album cover art features a close-up of a small, ice-covered stream or area of ponded water, which was taken by Monica Froese - the overlapping fragments of thin ice create a very nice abstract "geometric" effect and captures the icy, wintry mood of the recording. Overall this is an excellent album that is highly recommended to all electronica fans. For those folks that enjoyed this recording, three albums by Tangerine Dream including Atem (1973), Phaedra (1974), and Rubycon (1975), in addition to Timewind (1975) by Klaus Schulze are also highly recommended."

Amazing solo album from Tangerine Dream guy

BENJAMIN MILER | Veneta, Oregon | 08/12/2004

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Aqua, to me sounds a whole lot more like how Tangerine Dream would have sounded like between Atem and Phaedra than Green Desert would ever be. Green Desert had too many '80s digital add-ons making it too much resemble Le Parc or Underwater Sunlight than anything TD would have done in '73. Interestingly enough, Aqua came out after Phaedra, but you could swear it came out before. Most of the music is all done by Froese (with only Tangerine Dream bandmate Christophe Franke making a guest on one cut). The album is loaded with VCS-3 synth bubbles that sound like it came off Phaedra, with all sorts of bizarre sound effects that sound like it came off Alpha Centauri or Zeit. A lot of this album has a rather sinister sound, especially from the organ. That's especially true of the opening title track. "Panorphelia" is basically a pulsing synth sound with lots of great Mellotron. The Mellotron isn't used anywhere as much as his next solo album, Epsilon in Malaysian Pale, but at least he's still using it. "NGC 891" is the cut that Chris Franke makes a guest. No surprise that Franke plays the modular Moog. Mainly it's a repeated synth pattern against lots of different and wonderful sounds. "Upland" is the one that most resemble Phaedra, especially the organ. Imagine "Movement of a Visionary" without the trademark sequenced synthesizers and you're not too far off. The album boasted that the special sounds were used with an artifical head system invented by Günther Brunschen. I believe some of those sounds that sound like jets were by this system. No doubt that this album is a classic and an absolute must for those who enjoy what Tangerine Dream was doing around the same time."