One of my earliest memories is going out shopping with my mom
\n(who is partly – oh, hell,
\ntotally<\/i> to blame for me being the music junkie I am today)
\nto find a record. The film
\nThe Exorcist<\/i> had just come out, and people all around the
\ncountry found the film’s title theme to be a haunting, but
\nbeautiful, piece of work. The record where it came from,
\nTubular Bells<\/i>, was almost impossible to find in our area,
\nbut Mom got her hands on a copy. And the rest, they say, was
\nhistory. (I went on to wear out her copy, replace it with another,
\nand buy myself a copy which sits in the Pierce Memorial Archives
\n“Hall Of Fame.”)<\/p>\n
It escaped notice of many people that, had it not been for one
\nRichard Branson and his fledgling Virgin record label,
\nTubular Bells<\/i> never would have seen the light of day, having
\nbeen rejected by all the major labels. And that, kids, would have
\nbeen a goddamn shame. This record is one of the best
\nall-instrumental works I have heard since A&P brought back
\ntheir classical record collection.<\/p>\n
The whole album is one song, split into two movements. Oldfield,
\nknown only in his native Britain at the time, came up with this
\nastounding project, one which took balls the size of cantaloupes to
\nconceive and produce. I mean, he needed to write segments of music,
\nin all styles and flavors, that blended together almost seamlessly.
\nIt had to be flawless – and he
\nalmost<\/i> pulled it off – we’ll get back to that thought
\nlater.<\/p>\n
The portion of
\nTubular Bells<\/i> best known to many is the first movement, the
\nactual theme music from
\nThe Exorcist<\/i>. The opening piano line, quickly melded in with
\nan organ and bass line, immeditely captures the listener’s
\nattention. Oldfield played all but a few instruments on this one,
\nand he is able to handle each one’s nuances with astounding skill –
\nit seems like he has an entire orchestra at his command. (He would,
\na few years later – check out
\nThe Orchestral Tubular Bells<\/i>.)<\/p>\n
A work this expansive is extremely hard to quantify in terms of
\nsuccess (like I mentioned in an earlier Jethro Tull review, how
\ndoes one determine what movement is what? Was that the fifth or the
\nninth?), but the first side flows from one concept to another with
\nremarkable precision. One minute it is a mandolin chorus leading
\nthe tune, the next it is wild fretting of electric guitar. The
\nfirst side closes with the magnum opus, with Master of Ceremonies
\nViv Stanshall (in the only real vocal appearance on the album)
\nintroducing the instruments – including, of course, tubular
\nbells.<\/p>\n
The second side has some of the more “natural” music – with more
\nof a folk rock feel, especialy in Oldfield’s use of guitars and
\npiano. (The “vocals” of Piltdown Man, which sounds like Oldfield
\nafter a rough night at the pub, was always a favorite of mine as a
\nchild, and is still enjoyable today.) The free-form movement near
\nthe end is interesting to hear as it unfolds, though sometimes it
\nseems like Oldfield is having difficulty bringing his work to a
\nclose.<\/p>\n
Ah, the close – a country, hoe-down that builds itself into a
\nfrenzy. Here is where Oldfield makes the only mistake on the entire
\nalbum. This short portion of music sounds the most out of place –
\nit is almost as if he figured he’d featured all the other types of
\nmusic in
\nTubular Bells<\/i>, may as well throw some country into it.
\nWrong. Still, this is a small flaw in an otherwise incredible
\nwork.<\/p>\n
Oldfield never seemed to top
\nTubular Bells<\/i>, not for his lack of trying. (He made a
\nterrible mistake a few years ago when he released
\nTubular Bells 2<\/i>, which seems to rework his master piece
\nmeasure for measure. Avoid this one at all costs.) But if he were
\nto be remembered for only this album, it’s a grand way to be
\nremembered.
\nTubular Bells<\/i> is nothing short of a masterpiece, one flaw
\nand all, and should be in everybody’s collection.<\/p>\n
As for myself, I know what Mom is getting this Mother’s Day –
\nI’m going to update her copy of
\nTubular Bells<\/i> to compact disc.<\/p>\n
\nEditor’s note: I finally got around to reviewing<\/i> Tubular
\nBells 2
\nfour years after this review ran… did my opinion about that
\nalbum change? Guess you’ll have to dig up that review to find
\nout.)<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":24323,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[5651],"rating":[5646],"class_list":["post-35527","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-mike-oldfield","rating-rating-a"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/35527","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35527"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/35527\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24323"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35527"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35527"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=35527"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=35527"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}