Miditerranean Pads - Klaus Schulze

Advantages: Nice hypnotic grooves and soloing.
Disadvantages: Overlong, can be boring in parts.

...Klaus Schulze has released so much old material in boxed sets or re-issues in the past 10 years that it almost passed my notice that he hasn't released a straight forward new studio album for ages. And here it is, supposedly a "fan pleasing" album featuring a mix of his famed 70s sequencer style with his more rhythmic contemporary sound. The end result is rather a joyful upbeat album for Schulze. The standard overlong tracks are still there, but if you adjust your listening head to just float along, they pass by remarkably quickly. The 30 minute "Playmate In Paradise" is really a track in two halves. The first is his standard contemporary style of rhythmic backbeats with only very sparse soloing. The track is built up very slowly (as is Schulze's style, why rush?) Just as you think it is going on for far to long, it is enhanced... Read review

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Advantages: Excellent Sampler. Top recordings!
Disadvantages: Not all ' ASHRA ' songs.

...This sampler album of the ' Virgin ' years of ' ASHRA ' is an excellent introduction to there music if your not familiar with them .Oddly enough though some of the songs here are taken from guitarist / keyboard player M Gottsching's solo albums which are not ' ASHRA 'as such at all. However they are great songs. Originating in Germany in the late 60's early 70's they began life as ' Ashra Tempel 'with the now famous ' Klaus Schulze ' among there ranks, playing drums way back then. A now legendary Krautrock band, 'Ashra Tempel' fused space rock with long live jams and free rock. Devoid of songs.There early albums and especially there debut album are very sought after collectors items. In the mid 70's ' M Gottsching' went solo and with a couple of different members the trio called themselves just ' ASHRA' 'ASHRA'S' music is difficult... Read review

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Advantages: Glorious early 90s electronica by two genuine pioneers
Disadvantages: Might be hard to find

...Brain child of Pete Namlook (aka Peter Kuhlman) and Richie Hawtin, From Within was one of the first albums that alerted me to the joys of electronica and thus has a very special place in my musical heart. Pete Namlook, for those that have never encountered him, is a virtual electronica factory, at one point churning out an album almost once a fortnight and released on his independent Fax label. His work is wide and occasionally inconsistent. He has collaborated with innumerable musicians, many of which are of the highest order, such as the grandmaster of krautrock Klaus Schulze, Geir Jensen (aka Biosphere), Bill Laswell, Tetsu Inoue, Bobby Bird (aka HIA) and Jonah Sharp (and the list goes on and on). Pick up a Namlook CD and you can find yourself listening to anything from world music to experimental, minimalist ambient to early... Read review

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