Album title: Ommadawn
Artist: Mike Oldfield
Nationality: English
Sub-genre: Crossover Prog
Year: 1975
Position on list for that year: 7
Chronology: 4 of 26
Familiarity with artist: 3
Familiarity with album: 2
Gold Rated track(s): None of this is really applicable here...
Silver Rated track(s):
Wooden Rated track(s):
Comments: An interesting point here I didn’t know is that after the phenomenal success of his debut album, the now-classic
Tubular Bells, Mike Oldfield did not want another hit album. He was retiring from the limelight he had been most reluctantly and somewhat perhaps violently and certainly unexpectedly thrust into. He became a musical recluse, and this, his third album, was all recorded in a little farmhouse in the middle of nowhere. The title comes from an Irish word for idiot - amadan - but manages to also represent, you know, a bright new beginning for the artist. He would never have solo success again like he had with
Tubular Bells, although his albums would all be huge sellers. Those who know his name outside of his fanbase quote that album and the one or two hits he had with other people, such as Maggie Bell on “Moonlight Shadow” and “Family Man” and Roger Chapman on “Shadow on the Wall”. This has not stopped him becoming a multi-million-selling artist, but unless you’re into his music, the above, plus the well-known Christmas instrumental piece “In Dulce Jubilo” (oh, you’d know it if you heard it, believe me) are going to be the sum total of your knowledge or experience of him.
Not at all surprisingly, both for him and for the time, this is an album of two tracks, both almost completely instrumental, though the closing section of part two, called “On Horseback” has some nonsense lyrics in Irish. I must say, he does look very Christ-like on the cover, doesn’t he? The artist suffering for his art? Forcing his creation out despite his wish to be alone? Well maybe; I don’t know. Those eyes are extremely blue, aren’t they? Almost as blue as the Blue Stone of Galveston! (In-joke for those who know
Blackadder, watch, um, another space). At any rate, it’s the music we’re concerned with, and it’s an ambient, almost spiritual beginning to part one. Now, considering all the instruments he plays I’m not going to attempt to identify them, so, you know, suck it. I do wonder if this will build up in instrumental layers, like his famous debut? We’ll see I guess. I can hear certain echoes of that album here for sure; probably never really get away from it. I think there are like four versions of it now, not including
Tubular Bells II and
III.
Some pretty powerful electric guitar now - I believe the guitar is his first love and instrument of choice, and it features fairly prominently in
Tubular Bells too. Get a sense of the music not quite reaching a crescendo, but building in intensity now. Coming back down though with a breezy flute solo I think then joined by bass and some sort of keyboard and bouncing along with an almost Beatles flavour, heading nearly in a kind of brass band direction, though there’s no actual brass. Not yet anyway. Slowing down even more now with a nice little soft piano and some choral vocals or Prophet ARP or something, then we get into some almost tribal drums with a native chant which reminds me of stuff which surfaced on later Peter Gabriel solo albums and, to a lesser extent, some of Paul Simon’s work.
I suppose the idea of people rushing out to buy an instrumental album that has two tracks and runs for just over half an hour seems pretty unlikely now, but this was the 1970s and the likes of ELP, Yes and others were releasing albums of increasing complexity and length and decreasing numbers of tracks, and this went to number four in the charts. Wouldn’t even stand a chance of getting into the top forty these days I’m sure. Maybe we had better attention spans back then, or maybe it was just the golden age of progressive rock, and Oldfield benefited from that. Of course, there would also be those who bought it as a reaction to having bought and liked
Tubular Bells. Nevertheless, I think it was quite a feat to have this in the top five, and a tribute to the man’s popularity and determination not to just write what the public wanted. He certainly stayed true to his vision, and it stood to him in the end.
Part two opens on a grand, stately keyboard and piano piece, slow and dramatic, then it fades away to a nice sort of stripped-down acoustic guitar in a kind of pastoral vein, with electric joining in and fleshing out the sound, before uileann pipes are added and now the tune has, not surprisingly, a very Celtic feel. You can just imagine looking out across the misty fields towards the cloud-shrouded mountains as a clear lake sparkles in the distance, the sun striking dazzling reflections off its surface, as the sheep go about their morning, unimpressed by nature’s awe-inspiring beauty, and somewhere there’s the gentle chug-chug-chug of a tractor working in the fields. The final piece is that “On Horseback”, with the nonsense Irish lyric and it’s kind of a bit odd after the two instrumental pieces. I guess one of his little jokes, like that country bit at the end of
Tubular Bells II. Well now there are clearly English lyrics there too. Hmm. Okay. Good yes but I don’t think I’d have been rushing out to buy it personally myself.
Not on this album when released, but a special version the next year (1976) included that “In Dulce Jubilo” which became his signature Christmas song. I still wouldn’t be all that crazy about this album, but then, while of course I love
Tubular Bells, I wouldn’t class myself as a big Oldfield fan.
Personal Rating: 6