bigmoog wrote:andy, one word mate:
perfect
Cheers mate, here's a slightly edited version, without the eye strain
TANGERINE DREAM- LONDON ASTORIA, 20th April 2007
Pre-concert:
We were already in London having spent the night in a hotel just round the corner from the Astoria in Great Russell Street, so I missed the usual stress/excitement that we call ‘public transport’ (not to say the worry of getting the last train back, as we were booked into the Radison Hotel in Tottenham Court road earlier). Anyway we strolled around before finding a place to eat lunch. Strangely enough we were a few yards away from the Jack Horner at Yo Sushi! (I’d recommend it!). So around at 2 or 3 o’clock we walked round the corner into the pub. A quick glance around and I soon recognised a few faces, even if I couldn’t always put names to them. I spent some time chatting to Ben, so I must apologise if I did introduce myself to most of the fans. I did manage to say hello to Billy the Fish, Hobo, Clive and both Heiko’s from Germany, it was also an opportunity to personally thank Heiko H for all his hard work with the TT and TL discs, well above and beyond the call of duty, it must have been a massive strain, and not just to his valuable time and energy. Another highlight was meeting Big Moog (he exists I tell you!), it was great to ‘finally’ meet you mate. (note to self, bring some bleeding discs along next time, that way when JS and Mick are kind enough to do you CDRs then you won’t look and feel so embarrassed. Knowing my luck I’ll still forget). It was a bit strange not seeing Colin there right away, but somebody told me he was at the hotel, Gary perhaps? (no doubt crow barring the mini bar out of his room or making plans for an addition to his towel collection). Anyway after a short time Colin finally arrived, or should that be landed? It was good to see him (he’ll I didn’t even get any broken ribs this time
), after all no TD concert would be complete without him (a bit like a concert without Edgar or the ruck that always kicks off at the merchandise stall…unthinkable). A while later I also met up with my mate Chris and his girlfriend Jilly, as well as Theo who’d flown in from Greece especially for this gig (his second in 24 years? That’s dedication for you), it was nice to see them again. I had a quick chat, only to find some fans chatting up my girlfriend, er….I mean discussing the merits of various TD albums
. During this I took some rather half hearted photos (makes a mental note, get ‘all’ the fans to lineup outside the pub for a group shot next time). Once again I’m sorry if I missed 90% of the fans at the pub, but time was limited. It was also nice to meet Chris W and his wife and to have a quick chat about old concerts and fan tapes (Chris, you’re a hero!). I had a flying visit back to the hotel to drop off my decent Canon digital SLR and to pick up my crappy Fuji digital compact (not good for low light, but it’s been to at least 3 TD/ Jerome Froese concerts with me, so you’ve got to put up with it I guess), but at least it was small (more on this important factor later).
Meanwhile back at the pub people were beginning to peel off to walk down to the Astoria. There was a nagging feeling at the back of my mind that the queue wouldn’t be that big, due in part to the lack of advertising and some fans dislike of vocals. On the way down Alipaul introduced himself (although I’ve no idea how he knew it was me), so it was nice to spend a few minutes chatting about old concerts and what being a fan is really all about…the music! As per usual the ticket touts were out at this gig, and a right sorry state they were too (drunk or spaced out at 5.20 pm). The young couple behind us (nice tats btw mate!) were almost conned into paying £50 each for a ticket, good job they checked and found out the real price. It was strange to hear that the guy’s favourite album was Poland, it brought a few nods and remarks of appreciation from us.
I had a few minutes to walk back along the line to see how far the queue went into Soho Square…hmmm a fairly decent turn out (although it would be obvious that the concert wouldn’t be a sellout). During this an official photographer took a few shots of the queue, as well as the front of the Astoria. If he can make that place look good he’s a genius I thought. A few more minutes and the queue started to edge forward, which rather took me by surprise as I was still taking a few photos at the back of the queue…d’oh!.
Meanwhile…back in the queue…we entered the foyer/ticket hall of the Astoria. ‘Men of the left, women on the right’ shouted the venue’s security staff. ‘Ah!’ I thought ‘this is going to be interesting’ why? Because, I had just clipped my camera onto my belt behind me. I edged forward towards the security staff, as they frisked everyone as they entered. ‘Damn’ I didn’t think they’d search everyone’.
A quick frisk, and then the guy searching me said:
‘Is that a camera you’ve got there?’
Me-(in a rather squeaky voice) ‘er…it might be’ (I never break under interrogation)
Astoria geezer -‘empty your pocket please’
Me-‘er pocket?’
Him- ‘yeah, pocket’
Me- (relieved) ‘Oh right….look just change, my key…and…’
Him- ‘No, the small pocket’!
Me- ‘Eh’…?
Him-‘the small pocket, you’ve got something in there!’
Me- (with even more relief)…holding a small pill shaped object up to him ‘er it’s a button, it came of my shirt’
Cue…laughter
A few more seconds to dump off my girlfriends coat and we were into the main hall (and there’s me thinking that the London Dungeon was at London Bridge!). Ok I thought I’ll get the merchandise ruck out of the way now…and then to my horror…no merchandise stall. ‘I don’t believe it, they’ve only got one upstairs!’ Bang goes my chance of getting a disc, which was even more of a problem as I had promised Ben to get him a copy.
I quickly said hello to a few faces I know (cheers for the Phaedra DVD promo postcard!), and (I’ll admit) tried to ignore a fan who insisted on telling us his complete history (perhaps he reminded me too much of me?)
By this time the hall upstairs and downstairs was beginning to fill up, I saw Chris Owen right at the front of the balcony (jammy git!) and he shouted that TD weren’t using HD cameras (camera spotter?….nah, it was more down to us discussing about the softness of the last TD DVD recorded at the SBE and whether TD would be doing another for the Astoria gig
).
During this the PA had been playing some sea sounds (I’m sure quite a few fans took this as a cue to visit the toilet). The sound died away from time to time, only for a few lights to rake across the crowd. Ah, TD had three rows of lights this time, some directly over the crowd (better for recording images of the fans perhaps?).
The Concert: A Gig of Two Halves
The sea sounds grew louder and louder and the lights dipped behind the safety curtain as slowly they pulled apart: revealing Linda, Iris, Chris, Bernard and Edgar standing on the extreme right, almost propped up again a speaker stack playing the Blues Harp intro to Madcaps’ Flaming Duty
Madcaps Flaming Duty:
Chris started singing and the sound was perfect, hey I thought this is brilliant, his vocals work a treat and I’m going to love this. 10 minutes later and I was bored, why? I don’t know really, I mean I love the album, perhaps I know the album too well (I wasn’t panicking though, as I’ve found parts of TD’s gigs over the years boring as well, especially the start of the 1986 and 2005 concerts). Perhaps it was too distracting taking so many photos, however on the plus side the visuals and lighting were excellent this time (compare it to the woeful lighting at the same venue in 2003), with some great little clips of projected behind the group. During this my girlfriend had wandered off, only to return and say to me “That singer, he’s playing”!...ah I thought, ‘You know what? You’re spot on’!, in fact the whole MFD was coming off hard-disc, to be fair to TD perhaps they didn’t have enough time to rehearse it or perhaps it was too complex to do live 100%, either way and however you explain it, the sound was too perfect, don’t get me wrong I still liked it on a certain level, and I should point out I personally haven’t got a problem with TD triggering pre-recorded music, it’s the 21st century after all, and TD aren’t an acoustic rock band. One gripe I did have was that Iris’s drums were almost non-existent, now contrary to many fans ideas I actually like Iris’s percussion work (in fact I’d find it hard going to see them again if she wasn’t involved), so if she’s bashing seven bells out of everything on stage then I’d like to hear it please. The objective side of my brain kept telling me that Edgar and TD usually air-brush out their drummers live work on CDs or DVDs so the mix is less cluttered, but it’s the first time I’ve every heard her percussion edited out during the gig. Odd!. Anyway TD continued with the whole album and parts were excellent (I’ve read since that some fans were really touched by the music and several wet eyes were seen), and some less successful (MFD was never an album that was going to please all of the fans all of the time). So, after a rousing version of the Lake Of Pontchartrain (TD re-jigged the running order) Chris Hausl walked off to loud applause. I’m sure there was an extra energy at this point as well all didn’t have a clue what TD would play.
Older stuff
This time the sound quality was totally different, much more punchy, and shock horror a long sequencer part started (the actual name of the piece I couldn’t remember), but it was complemented with some nice subtle keyboard work from Edgar and Thorsten, leading into what was probably most fans personal highlight of the night, a new and pumped up version of Sphinx Lightning (titled re-titled Hyper Sphinx), I loved it. Again and again new layers were built upon, but in keeping with the original (pun intended), such as old PPG and vocoder samples. Brilliant! (several days later I found out that this track appears on the limited edition EP, if you like TD’s 80’s stuff then this disc is a must have), just when you thought it couldn’t be improved… then Edgar played his guitar; honestly it just took the whole track to a different level. Superb! A few crashing wave effects and TD were off once again on a trip down memory lane, this time it was a re-worked track from Le Parc, followed by Rare bird from Poland , Canyon Voices from the Canyon Dreams video soundtrack, Logos, and some stuff from Exit (the title track I seem to remember). By this time we’d both had enough of standing in the same spot, so we retired to the back of the hall. It was interesting to see a TD gig from a different angle, including a close up of TD’s ‘Front of House’ light and sound mixing desks, very impressive.
Later they played a storming version of Sphinx Red Lightning (from the album TD plays TD) …stunning, and the lighting effects improved with each track (hell, it almost got so light that my camera could ‘almost’ focus). It’s hard now trying to remember the exact order of things as I was rather distracted with taking photos, but the main set ended to great applause (as well as few half serious calls of ‘play something decent’…Klaus Schulze fans they get everywhere!
.
TD returned to play several tracks old and new (I seem to remember that there was the finale from Jeanne d’Arc, followed by a rather predictable version of House of the Rising Sun. It was only now that TD reached the volume they used to play at and the bass heavy lines could be felt in your chest. During this Bernard had a lot of fun doing a rip roaring guitar solo, brilliant and I’m not much of a rock fan either.
The crowd gave a huge roar and the house lights went up. Edgar grabbed a microphone and said a few words, something like he always felt that they got a good audience in the UK and that their fans were intelligent (yeah….read on mate
), before introducing the band to even more applause, as well as a few shouts and laughs. Even Chris Hausl grabbed the mic to say ‘let’s hear it for Edgar’…could this be his last gig in the UK? The fans kept cheering and clapping even when the roadies came on stage to mock boos and catcalls (cue, ‘hey. We’re roadies, not musicians’ shrugs from the crew on stage.
Did I enjoy the gig? Hmm hard to say, brilliant in places, boring in others.
After the Concert: The Big maze In Search Of Merchandise
After the applause had died away, I thought I’d try and get some merchandise from upstairs, so after going through the exit from the lower floor I slipped into another corridor and up some stairs (going again the flow of fans trying to get out), only to find myself (much to my dismay) right back where I had started. Hmmm perhaps I should just buy the limited edition disc from Groove or CDS as other fans had suggested? Slightly crestfallen I left the hall for the second time, just as Edgar’s wife Bianca was entering (being the gentleman I am, I opened the door for her). Danke!...how did she know I was half German?
Once again I began the seven circles of Hell to the exit, but I still wanted to get some merchandise (why pay the mark up these online traders ask for? It seemed daft as I was in the same building….so I tried again, this time trying a different staircase, which after a few feet was blocked by a girl working for the Astoria, a few words with her and she told me that yes in fact the merchandise stall was still open. Excellent I thought, it’ll be totally empty…er I must have been simple or something, it was still 5 or 6 deep at the counter (and getting worse by the second). Anyway, nothing ventured etc etc…so I joined the queue. Roughly 10 minutes later I was at the front and bought 4 limited edition EP CDs (none of which are destined for eBay before you complain). 5 postcards (one of which I later gave to Mr Big Moog to say thanks for his disc), A promo postcard for the Phaedra concert DVD (a little late Voiceprint, but they’re probably still pissed off as they have 15,000 copies of the live CD they can’t sell), lastly I got a unsigned MFD poster (I was informed that ‘all’ of the signed one’s had sold out within minutes, you can guess my surprise when I checked it 24 hours later to find it was in fact one of the signed versions…excellent!). I passed on the MFD double DVD/CD and the usual spare copies of the Keep (this year they were at £30, but then again that’s much cheaper then eBay). Whilst in the queue I managed to call my girlfriend just to let her know what was happening, and then to have a chat with Chris Owen, so that perhaps we could meet up after he had bought the items he was after (Chris was behind me in the queue). After this I made as quick an exit as I could, only to run into Daz, Colin and Big Moog outside. I got the impression that they wanted to go back to the pub, apart from Daz who had to get his last train back to Birmingham (nice meeting you mate…I hope you got home ok). By this time food was needed, so we stopped off at the local chippie on the corner of Oxford Street (why do chips always taste so good at night?), and then headed up Tottenham Court road.
Back at the Pub, A drink of more than two halves: sponsored by Ginster’s Pasties:
Well what do you know? It seemed that a good number of fans had returned to the pub (a quick check of my watch confirmed it was only just past 10 O’clock, which made a nice change to the usual ‘mad dash’ across London for the last train, tube or bus). Anyway it was great to catch up with a few fans back at the Jack Horner, including, Colin, Garry, Chris Janus, Theo (who looked as if he’d thoroughly enjoyed himself, which I thought was excellent, could you imagine not seeing your favourite group for 24 years, travelling hundreds and hundreds of miles, only to have a bad gig? It didn’t bare thinking about), Big Moog, Stephen and Mick (makes a mental note, don’t stand too close too Mick when he’s eating a Pasty
) we spent some time chatting to Mick, (btw nice bag of TD CDs mate, another haul from Fopp, I just hope you could sneak them past your misses). A few fans had started to leave at this point, which was a shame as the doors opened and Thorsten and Chris walked into the pub (I take it Colin had something to do with this!), Thorsten looked very relaxed, until that is everyone gave him a cheer and then he looked a tad scared
with a ‘Whoa!, steady on’ look on his face. Nice to shake the guy’s the hand, even though he didn’t know me from Adam (so far all of TD’s musicians seem to be really nice blokes). Colin (as per usual was very enthusiastic, and wanted me to get a photo with both of them, but to be honest it’s not my type of thing, after all I’m sure they just wanted a quick drink after the gig. However I did ask Thorsten if it was ok to take a photo of him and Chris with Colin (I really need to retire that camera as the flash didn’t work!). So it was time to leave, there was just a few minutes left to shake hands with Chris Hausl and thank him for his excellent singing on MFD (once again he was very modest about it, it makes a change to the usual massive egos you expect in the music business), and then to say goodbye to as many fans that I knew. Here’s to the next time!
What an absolutely wonderful sight 
