Dancing Toward the One is exactly the kind of tape I seek in the wilds. There was a lot of very interesting music released in the world during the 1980s that never saw a vinyl pressing, nor a CD later in the decade. Both were too expensive to produce whereas the lonely tape was much cheaper to get out to the masses.
Based on what I've read, Roth was a key mover and shaker in the health and body dance movement, something she invented to overcome a skiing accident. This kind of thinking was coming to prominence in the 80s. There are many tapes in the new age genre, the key is finding the ones that are musically interesting. It appears to me that most of Roth's output is electronic / trance dance oriented, and that started with her creating the Raven label (I'm sure Discogs has the wrong appellation for the label here). I did buy one of her other later tapes so we'll see how it compares.
In any case Dancing Toward the One / Sacred Rock represents her debut, and I would submit this is one of those "accidental" cool albums we often find here in America. Her sound hasn't been shaped yet, and there are at least 15 musicians on the album. It's more tribal than dance, and best of all for us, it can get very psychedelic! The overall sound isn't that far removed from what was happening in England during time with the UK festival psych scene. I really don't think that was her intent, and yet the end result is very satisfying, and comes from a completely different perspective.
There are only two side long tracks here and neither are named 'Dancing Toward the One' or 'Sacred Rock'. Rather side one is 'Sing the Body' described as thus by Roth: "Is the first power chant I received from the spirit..." Wellll....good. I almost put the tape back after reading that. I thought to myself "here we go...". But I also thought "it's only 69 cents..." lol. The second side longer is titled 'Can You See Me' and this has the following description: "Was created in a healing circle as a dance meditation to be done in pairs." Nothing beats a healing circle... as long as it has loud psych guitars! Honestly the trance like rhythms aren't that far removed from what Can had created only a decade earlier. And while the vocals are not near as psychotic as Damo, they aren't too bad on the whole.
The world is an interesting place. Worth grabbing this one.
Ownership: 1982 The Moving Center (MC).7/6/24 (review / new entry)
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