Star Inc. - Inner Spirits (1985)

Neat little charity shop find with some great synth textures to be found amidst an hour's worth of New Agey mid-80s electronica, courtesy of Dutch session musician Ed Starink.  Inspired by Jean-Michel Jarre, Vangelis and Jan Hammer, Starink kitted out his own studio in the 80s with the latest synths and cranked out dozens of 'Space Themes'-type cover albums under various aliases, as well as albums of his own music like this one.

The back cover of Inner Spirits lists an impressive rig for '85, including a Fairlight, Emulator, Roland microcomposer, LinnDrum and all the Korgs, Yamahas and Minimoogs of the day, and Starink gets to work with a bare bones beat that develops nicely on the opening track with a definite Jan Hammer influence.  Second track Crystalline might have some seriously odd production choices in its middle section (thought my headphones had died the first time that hard panning came up), but thereafter the album settles down.  It's a nice tour around the hardware of its day, with quite a few memorable melodies and an obvious talent for arrangement.  If you fancy a mostly mellow hour of 80s electronics, you could do a lot worse than this.

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