Edgar Froese (Tangerine Dream) in Conversation With Nanny Cantaloupe

Chances are pretty good we don’t have to explain who Tangerine Dream are. You already knew they’ve been cemented in the annals of pioneering electronic music for their mastery of transportational soundscapes, crafted from the early 70′s on. Perhaps behind only Pink Floyd or the Grateful Dead are they considered universally as the quintessential stoned-with-headphones experience. Well, founder Edgar Froese never really stopped creating. 40+ years later Froese and his current band-mates aren’t hauling the same humongous walls of modular analog synths on the road with them, but they are on the road. In July 2012, they played the 2,300 person-capacity Club Nokia in Los Angeles.

We won’t lie. It wasn’t exactly easy to arrange this interview. After much rescheduling and thumb-twiddling we were ushered backstage into Edgar’s velvety dressing room nearly an hour before the venue’s doors were to open. His friendly assistant asked if we could keep it to 10 minutes. Sure that seemed tight, but we were happy to do whatever. Then Edgar proceeded to bleed the history of the band all over us, in a super-relaxed manner, as if he had all day.