Tangerine Dream: Celebrating 50 years of Phaedra
Barbican, London

TEN years ago the trailblazing German electronic group Tangerine Dream performed what they called the Phaedra farewell tour. This saw group founder and only constant member Edgar Froese play his last gigs before he died in 2015.

But while it turned out to be an unequivocal farewell for him, the baton has been passed on to new band leader Thorsten Quaeschning, who is joined by fellow synth wizard Paul Frick and violinist Hoshiko Yamane.

So while it’s highly unusual for any band to continue with no original members, this sold-out show is testament to Tangerine Dream’s legacy, which transcends any ego-driven personalities more associated with rock bands and brings the group more in-line with the classical music world.

Tangerine Dream’s prolific back catalogue since forming in 1967 includes dozens of studio albums and scores for over 50 film, television and video game soundtracks. Among the most celebrated is 1974’s pioneering sequencer-driven classic Phaedra, which, like their farewell tour of a decade ago, forms the basis of this 50th anniversary celebration.

The staging is impressive. Quaeschning appears as if in a spaceship in front of a huge wall of electronic equipment, while his fellow band-mates flank him on either side. Frick is more unassuming behind his own bank of tech while Yamane stands out, her violin lending feeling to music that can at times have the emotion of R2D2.

The first hour is dedicated to Phaedra, including reworkings of tracks from that album, and it’s as if Quaeschning takes us on a cosmic journey in his spaceship; the effect helped a little by psychedelic video projections and beams of UV light that dot the stage.

After this exhilarating display, Quaeschning and his crew take a moment to catch their breath before the second half, which sees them launching into a selection of tracks from their vast oeuvre. They include two from the GTA V soundtrack (now considered one of the greatest video games ever made) — No Happy Endings and Los Santos City Map — and Betrayal from the soundtrack to Hollywood film Sorcerer.

A few from latest album Raum, only the second to be released since Froese’s death, are played — Continuum, Portico, Raum and You’re Always On Time, the latter having all the ’80s retro charm of a John Carpenter.

The album has been composed and produced using Froese’s arrangements that he had been developing before his death on the music production software Cubase.

Tangerine Dream are billed to play for two hours, but in the end they actually treat us to two-and-a-half. Nobody is in a hurry to leave. We look forward to Phaedra’s 60th anniversary celebration.