Michael Rother is probably not a name that floats to the top when one is questioned about influential musicians. This is an injustice. Rother's effect on ambient, techno, house, acid jazz, and space music is enormous. If you listen you will hear the echoes of Rother's early works in the recordings of the Chemical Brothers, Andreas Vollenweider, Vangelis and Dead Can Dance. Rother, who first gained notoriety with an early Kraftwerk line-up, really made his bones with the band Neu!. Here Rother graces us with his eighth solo album, his first release in nearly a decade.

As can be expected when the words "music" and "Kraftwerk" are spoken in the same sentence, we are speaking here about an artistic creation that is totally synthetic. The music is electronic, minimalist, hypnotic and just a bit alien. Fortunately, all of these adjectives can be quite positive when they are used to describe the music of Michael Rother.

I would like to warn you that this kind of music is designed for a purpose. Like the repetitive droning experiments of Brian Eno, ambient electronica can fall apart if one sits down to be entertained. Use the music responsibly, however, and doors can open for you. So what is "responsible" use of this music? Well, for me this means playing this as a "mixer" for another activity - meditating, painting, exercising, fly tying, whatever. Let the music just flow through you and you will find that your pulse soon matches the sampled beat. Think ambience.

So, what does Mr. Rother's newest release sound like? Track One, Side One, "Silver Sands," pretty much gives a taste of the whole. The piece is squeaky clean with none of the annoying analog euphony, recording venue air, captured space or performance hall reverberation. Everything is created, manipulated, layered and sculpted. This is not to say it does not "sound good" - it does. It has deep bass, complex personality and a huge soundstage. It just does not sound "real" - and it shouldn't.

"Kristall" is a perfect cut for a radio show like Hearts of Space. It is the sonic equivalent of computerized virtual reality. Rother builds a musical canvas of repetitive loop, and then splashes spacey synthesizer exclamations in the most carefully chosen places. With meticulous control, Rother plays every instrument and extracts precisely the colors he wants from within the machine's dark soul of chips, capacitors and resistors

It is important to mention that this vinyl release offers four "hand-picked bonus tracks not available on CD." Of these, "Nachtpassage" is my favorite by a small margin. A limited edition release, this vinyl package meets the muster. It is well pressed, sonically excellent in its own way, and musically relevant (if used responsibly). If you like space music or ambient music I am sure you consider find Esperanza and worthy addition to your collection.

[Apostrophe Productions, a joint venture of Atma-Sphere Music Systems and Root Cellar Records, was founded to release titles that have never been on LP before, but should be. ESPERANSA, by the German artist Michael Rother, is their first production.]