13 previously lost/unheard downer-ambient synth excursions from Dutch DIY tape music maven, Enno Velthuys. A child of the excesses and excitements of the psychedelic 60s, Velthuys spent the 80s in a recovery of sorts sequestered in a small room in his mother's apartment where he indulged his introverted tendencies through a solo exploration of dream-laced synth-led songwriting. We've heard products of this period before with the Dead Mind reissues of Landscapes In Thin Air and Different Places, and we're on much the same track here, romantic and lonesome new age drift and moonage ethereality that suggest Velthuys had an urge to astral project beyond the confines of the four walls of that small room. This version of Velthuys may have emerged around the birth of underground cassette music in the 80s but it feels more closely tied to the Berlin School of the 70s, while traces of his former life in bands emerge in the guitar twang of tracks like 'Thin Air'. Mostly, there's a distinct European coffee-house elan present throughout that could be beamed in from the drama of Sartre's Roads to Freedom trilogy, replete with smoke and mirror mystery, and a dreamer's existential gloom. Indeed, for those kissed with a certain weltschmerz, this is the essential soul music.
FFO: Eno & Cluster, Laurie Spiegel, K. Leimer, Hessell Veldman
