Tangerine Dream — Sorcerer (O.S.T)

“Sorcerer” was the first soundtrack album recorded by German electronica /ambient innovators Tangerine Dream - over the last thirty years or so the band have gone onto record another 31 soundtrack albums. The  original album came out in 1977, and this reissue gives the album a new remastering, restores the original art work, and adds in illustrated/informative booklet that features a new essay about the album by respected music journalist Malcolm Dome.

One would think from the films title that “Sorcerer” was some kind of fantasy or sci-fi type movie, but instead the film was a 1977 thriller adventure movie directed by William Friedkin(The Exorcist, The French Connection & To Live and Die in L.A.). The film was a remake of  an 1953 French film “Le Salaire de la Peur” (The Wages of Fear), and it started  Roy Scheider, Francisco Rabal & Bruno Cremer.  The films plot finds four international criminals on the run from the law, they hide out in a remote village in Nicaragua whose economy is dependent on a major oil company. Over 200 miles away from the village an oil well has caught fire, and this can be extinguished only with explosives. The criminals are given a chance to earn a great deal of money, no questions asked, by driving trucks carrying unstable dynamite into the blazing oil well. Because they were improperly stored, the sticks are now "sweating" nitroglycerin and could detonate if subjected to any kind of shock or vibration. Driving in teams of two, they meet various hazards on their journey, including a dilapidated rope-suspension bridge swinging violently in a huge storm over a flood-swollen river, a massive tree blocking the road, and a number of desperate, dangerous bandits.

The soundtrack Tangerine Dream scored for the movie offers up twelve tracks in all, and these tracks nicely vary from the  edgy building & receding “Main Theme”, which bubbles & ebbs up a mixture of murky, noisy  & mysterious electronic drone matter & synth textures.  Onto the slow throbbing & ebbing synth/ guitar scaping dramatic harmonics of “The Call”. Through to the sinister & oppressive synth opening of “Creation”, which later moves into nice brooding ‘n’ bobbing electronic groove thats  weaved with blues touched guitar soloing.  Onto the hovering & electro cello like simmering, wail and synth bobbing  of  “Abssy”, which from time to time hints at early almost early techno &  electro industrial  like fills & dwells.  All told the soundtracks mangers a nicely balancing act between the more moody, noisy textured & experimental tracks, and more bobbing, dramatic & tuneful work.

The colour 16 page inlay booklet features a whole host of rare pictures of the band, album reviews, film stills, various film posters from around the world, and a new four page essay by Malcolm Dome- this informative & well written essay discusses how Tangerine Dream first came on board with the project, the creation of the soundtrack, and how the soundtrack is seen in the wider Tangerine Dream discography. One of the most fascinating facts I learned from the essay was that Friedkin said that if he’d heard Tangerine Dream at the time of scoring The Exorcist, he would have used them instead of Mike Oldfield…so it’s interesting to wonder what might have been if TD had done The Exorcist soundtrack. 

All the told this is a well put together & thought-out reissue of this early soundtrack work by Tangerine Dream- well worth a look if you’re a fan of TD soundtrack work, or  a fan of genreal creative electronic sound-tracking.