Music Arcades: Tangerine Dream: Brighton 1986

Technically speaking, this double CD shouldn't be included here, since I no longer own it. Having got it at the end of 2008 from Amazon Marketplace, I gave it away to John B about a year ago. But I never like to let the facts get in the way of a good story. Or even an inconsequential anecdote, which is what you're about to get.

John and I were both at the Brighton Dome the night this album was recorded. It was John's 25th birthday that day (also the day I was invited to be interviewed for a Masters course in Belfast, but declined on the grounds that I'd already booked my Tangerine Dream ticket). That's how I know that the date of the recording was definitely 24th March 1986, not 25th as stated on the cover. You can do the maths and work out how old John will be in 16 days' time: he's celebrating the way so many middle-aged men do — with a kite-surfing party on Spain's Atlantic coast.

I'm not sure how thrilled John was to be given the album, but it's the thought that counts. Meanwhile, happily, my memory of the music on this album is literally as clear as an 320 kbps MP3. So often when people say 'literally' they actually mean anything but literally, but for once I'm as good as my word. The recording confirms what I remember from 25 years ago, which is that this Brighton Dome show was OK, but not a patch on the one five years previously. Sadly recordings of that earlier show have never been widely available, but those from Aachen and Paris from 1981 capture something of how I remember it, and they're far superior to Brighton 1986, despite poorer sound quality. (All of these albums are from the so-called Bootmoon Series, which seems to be in a grey zone as regards licensing and legitimacy.)

You can tell just from the track titles and lengths where the interest in this album lies. Stratosfear 86 is just a warmed-up rehash of the old track by that name. But the long tracks with unique titles — Akash Deep at 12'56" and Cool Breeze of Brighton at 10'49" — are where the band give themselves more freedom improvise and to stretch themselves. In '81 there were more like that.