INTERVIEW OF PAUL HASLINGER. FROM TANGERINE DREAM TO THE SONIC GEOGRAPHIES OF noion MUSIC (4)

 

[Interview by Jacopo Vigezzi, originally published in Prog Rock Journal, July 10; republished with permission.  Link ]  

 In Edgar Froese’s autobiography “Force Majeure,” he shares several stories about your time together. Looking back at the 1986-1990 era, what do you feel was your most significant contribution to the band’s evolution during those years?


I have not yet had a chance to read Force Majeure, but I think any story involving two people will inevitably be told differently from each side. I will always be extraordinarily grateful to Edgar and Chris for asking me to be part of the band and, ultimately, making possible the career I have had.

It is difficult for me to assess the significance of my own contributions in Tangerine Dream. If you asked me which album I feel has stood the test of time, I would single out Underwater Sunlight. If the question were directed toward soundtracks, I would mention Miracle Mile.

The most significant event during those five years, viewed from my current perspective, was the split between Edgar and Chris in late 1987. It fundamentally changed the fabric of the band, and from that point onward an important aspect of balance was missing.


You remain in occasional contact with Chris Franke in Los Angeles. Is a future collaboration between the two of you something that remains a possibility, or is that chapter purely part of the "memory palace" now?


 
Haha… my impression is that Chris has his hands full with all kinds of technical projects, and he is pretty happy and content where he is. When I worked with Peter on Neuland, we had some contact with Chris, but he was then as he is now keeping very busy with his various projects. Chris, like Edgar and Peter, has a very unique musical talent, and his guidance and production support were crucial in making Underwater Sunlight what it is. I remember driving with him one grey Berlin morning to Hansa Studios to record the piano parts for the album. And knowing that Chris was out there, making sure it would sound good, directly enabled that performance.


You recently collaborated with Peter Baumann for “Neuland.” What did that project teach you about your own musical roots that you’ve brought into the foundation of noion?


I originally met Peter when Tangerine Dream signed to his label, Private Music, in 1988. He was also instrumental in helping me begin a new phase of my career in Los Angeles during the 1990s.
So we’ve known each other for quite some time. And like with Edgar and Chris, we always had a lot of fun, whether we were simply spending time together or working on creative projects.

If you will, Neuland was a significant step in the direction of NOION. It was a first attempt to play by our own rules and build a label ecosystem around the work.

Unfortunately, not everything worked out as planned, and we were unable to realize the project in a live setting as originally envisioned. In retrospect, I think we should have focused more on the label aspect and built everything a bit more slowly.

But as is often the case in life, those learning experiences eventually led to NOION and to a different approach in launching and managing both the label and the projects it supports. 

TANGERINE DREAM CONCERT, PARIS, OLYMPIA, 31 March 1986

 

 I just came across this text in my archives, written forty years ago, following Tangerine Dream’s two concerts at the Olympia in Paris in 1986.

Those concerts were organized by Serge Leroy, with the help of the Crystal Lake association.

Who could have predicted this long friendship with Paul Haslinger, which led to his participation on several Lightwave albums and, over the past year, to this collaborative effort that resulted in the creation of the noion music label and the first two albums produced together, “Mallarmé” and “Borges,” set to be released on July 10 on Bandcamp and all platforms?

Life sometimes holds surprising surprises….

 ———————————————

Who could have guessed that the leading band of European electronic music—those experimentalists who propelled trippy music to the top of the charts in the 1970s—would make such a sensational comeback?

 
Hey, guys, set your preconceptions aside for a moment... Open your ears and your eyes, let go of those overhyped labels... To you, is TANGERINE DREAM just ancient history? A bygone era? Are they musicians who have nothing left to say? Is it the outdated sound of modular synths and old-man music? Don’t get stuck on those preconceptions... Don’t trust musical “trends”… Just because the media ignores a band or an artist doesn’t mean their music is bad or outdated.  

So, as we were saying…  The March 31 concert at the Olympia… A truly special event… None of the major Parisian concert promoters had taken the risk of putting on this show… . “Tangerine Dream is over…,” they said… “There’s too much risk with a band that hasn’t been to France in five years…” So, it was a small association promoting electronic music, CRYSTAL LAKE, that decided to take on the challenge. They learned the ropes on the job and did everything: raising funds, handling press relations, advertising, and setting up all the technical infrastructure to accommodate the three musicians and a technical crew of about fifteen people... CRYSTAL LAKE truly moved mountains and proved that an alternative was possible in the world of show business... And so the big day arrived...

When the first notes rang out in the pitch-black Olympia, with the curtain drawn across the stage, we immediately noticed a change in sound. TANGERINE DREAM hadn’t played in France for five years. True, many albums have been released during this time. But the live sound has a warmth, an irreplaceable power. There are flute sounds, polyphonies that layer upon one another and create an atmosphere of anticipation. Anticipation, because it’s only after a minute that the curtains open… revealing the stage. It’s THE shock. I’m a regular at Dream concerts, yet every time, I can’t help it—it grabs me by the throat, my heart races, and I’m overcome.

Three massive cabinets, racks housing sequencers, mixing consoles, sound processing effects, synth expanders, and computer screens. In front, stacked keyboards. Between the racks and the keyboards, Edgar FROESE (on the left), Chris FRANKE (in the center), and Paul HASLINGER (on the right). This 23-year-old musician is the surprise of this tour: he brings a fresh look, energy, and technique that perfectly complement the expertise of FRANKE and FROESE.

 

So, as I was saying, the curtains open and I’m blown away. I’m blown away by the mountain of equipment, which flashes, pulses, oscillates, and beckons. I’m also blown away by the light show. Tangerine Dream has finally decided to create a visual environment that matches the caliber of its music. These are computer-controlled lights that create a hellish ballet of beams and colors materializing above the musicians. There are also projections standing out against the backdrop of the stage: clouds drifting across an abstract sky, flames twisting and setting the stage ablaze for the duration of a song, computer-generated geometric patterns... And then, the interplay of mirrors and reflective balls that make an entire audience
feel seasick, embarking on a cosmic journey through stars and galaxies. 

 

The music hits hard. The volume is cranked up to the max, and TANGERINE DREAM is certainly one of the loudest bands out there. You physically feel the bass, and you cling to your seat during certain infrasonic explosions. The rhythms are hellish. A drummer plays like a one-armed man alongside the electronic percussion programmed by our friends. It’s all breaks, rhythmic skids, tempo accelerations, and a barrage of beats—thanks to the use of very short delays—that give the impression the drumstick is bouncing and jittering on the drums. The music swings, pounds, and rocks. TANGERINE DREAM is at the top of its game. Chris FRANKE programs all the rhythms on computers, plays the Emulator, and changes floppy disks from time to time. Paul HASLINGER handles the polyphonies like a true pro: punchy chords and manual rhythms that underscore and accentuate the programmed beats. Edgar FROESE remains the melodist, who, with an ethereal phrasing, crowns it all. No, actually, I don’t know. It’s hard to tell who’s doing what, so tightly knit and absorbed are the three musicians. 

All their machines are interconnected and interact simultaneously. At one point, Paul and Edgar leave their keyboards and pick up their guitars. The volume cranks up another notch, and the rhythm section goes completely wild. By comparison, hard rock is music for seniors... The guitars scream and the musicians are having a blast. So is the crowd. It’s awesome... Chris FRANKE, absorbed in his rhythmic and percussive antics, calls his bandmates back to order: a chord on the Emulator and—boom—everyone returns to their respective keyboards for the rest of the set. By turns trippy, cosmic, melodic, and percussive, a hyper-professional show, where Dream, in a hyper-technological environment, with synths some of which are still prototypes, offers us unique music. We can’t think of anyone who can compare to them right now...

Well, yes, you missed something fabulous... The event of the month in March wasn’t the elections, but the DREAM concert. So, the next time TANGERINE DREAM comes to Paris, don’t say, when you see the posters: “That’s music from the past…”
“That’s the music of the future”
Because the future is today.