Let’s get one thing absolutely out in the open at the start:
\nSally Oldfield is not the same kind of musician as her brother
\nMike. If you’re expecting to hear a female version of
\nTubular Bells<\/i>, stop reading here, ’cause you’re gonna be
\ndisappointed.<\/p>\n
\nFlaming Star<\/i>, the latest disc from Oldfield, is kind of
\ndisappointing in itself. After a strong start, Oldfield dissolves
\ninto a weaker version of Peter Gabriel, albeit with a more
\nspiritual (not meaning religious) bend to the music. It’s tribal
\nand earthy at times, spacey at others – and it sometimes feels like
\nOldfield herself doesn’t quite know what to do with the grooves
\nbeing laid down.<\/p>\n
Oh, things start off in an amazing way with the title track. The
\nchants leading into Oldfield’s vocal line help drive the song
\nforward, and Oldfield herself has a sound that makes me think this
\nis what Madonna might have tried had she kept following the vein of
\nsongs like “Frozen”. But don’t think for a moment that Oldfield is
\na pop artist; she is more interested in exploring the music and its
\ndeeper, more spiritual side.<\/p>\n
In a way, this might be the flaw with
\nFlaming Star<\/i>. Not that following a spiritual path with the
\nmusic is bad at all – indeed, many discs I’ve listened to of late
\nhave had a spiritual nature, and the music has been breathtaking.
\nBut Oldfield seems to be merely content as a voyager on this
\njourney, and not the captain of the ship. (I’d dare to call
\nmulti-instrumentalist Martin Savale, otherwise referred to as “Babu
\nStorn,” in control, even though Oldfield herself wrote the much of
\nthe music.)<\/p>\n
This willingness to let the music carry you to its own
\ndestination can be a dangerous thing in the wrong hands; I think of
\nthe jams the Grateful Dead got into in their concerts, and realize
\nthere were some where the band just didn’t have a clue where to
\ntake the music. This is the case with Oldfield; tracks like
\n“Samurai Of The Sun” all but scream for further development, and
\nfail to achieve what they could well have been. Others, like
\n“Ascension,” come a little closer to the mark, but without a strong
\nguiding hand, the listener is left adrift in the musical cosmos.
\nThis, I don’t believe, was Oldfield’s intention.<\/p>\n
The lyrics to much of
\nFlaming Star<\/i> are supposed to lead the listener, as the
\ndisc’s liner notes say, to a “higher understanding”. Of what, I
\ndon’t know, since most of the lyrical work tends to become blended
\nwith the music. Even the remix of “Mirrors,” a song which was a hit
\nfor Oldfield, falls flat.<\/p>\n
Using music to uncover a new awareness of life and the world
\naround you is an ideal which many musicians have struggled to
\naccomplish for many years. I don’t doubt that Oldfield is sincere
\nin her quest, and that she has the talent to achieve that goal. But
\neven with the occasional strong performance,
\nFlaming Star<\/i> suggests that even she could benefit from a
\nmusical road map.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":26013,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[6654],"rating":[11204],"class_list":["post-37223","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-sally-oldfield","rating-rating-c-minus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/37223","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=37223"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/37223\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26013"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37223"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37223"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=37223"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=37223"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}