Cosmic Hoffmann
Beyond the Galaxy
Cosmic Hoffmann is Klaus Hoffmann Hoock from Mind Over Matter. As on their recent album ‘Avatar’ Stephen Parsick makes an appearance and I think this time takes more of a part throughout rather than just on occasional passages. Ron Boots even helps out on one track. We drift through the ether on faint solar winds to a zone ‘Beyond the Galaxy’. A rapid sequence starts to develop low in the mix but soon gains full strength and bursts through. Its all very Ashra sounding, think of’’ New Age of Earth’ or ‘Inventions....’ and you won’t be far off the mark. Klaus’ guitar shimmers all around then breaks through making a tremendous impact, being intense but complimenting the synth background and sequence without dominating them. Amazing blistering stuff! The sequence fades away for a very brief Asian influenced section. A new sequence momentarily enters but we return to more tranquil realms to finish.

‘The Gate of Lahore Part 1’ rumbles with brooding menace, great mellotron sounds oozing to the surface.The space effects here really are out of this world (sorry for the pun). For much of the track though Edgar Froese’s ‘Epsilon in Malaysian Pale’ inevitably comes to mind. ‘Howling Wolves’ was apparently recorded in 1978 and initially is full of deep space cosmic twitters and howls. The sequence wastes no time in advancing to the surface and straight away takes you to those wonderful late 70s to early eighties years which many of us still haven’t come down from. The main question that comes to mind is how could he have resisted releasing this for so long. What a sequence! Again the Mellotron plays an important role but even with such a superb sequence and mellotron chords only half the story is being told. The sounds emitting from the barrage of other analogue equipment are pure heaven. Wow!

Much of what was said about Part 1 also applies to ‘The Gate of Lahore Part 2’ though somewhat darker and the ‘Epsilon’ comparisons aren’t as appropriate. Think more of ‘Atem’ and ‘Phaedra’. More brilliant analogue space effects get ‘Wanderers of Time’ underway. What we have here is a deep space floater that wouldn’t have been out of place on a Vidna Obmana album. So to sum up this album has everything. Almost half of it features the most superb sequencer passages whilst the other half takes you to other worlds some of them dark and ominous and others more tranquil. This is nothing like the music of Mind Over Matter but is a superb CD nevertheless. Highly recommended. (DL)

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