#tubular bells ii

[yukkuriyakumo]

Today's my birfday look at the stuff I got

[sorcjapan]

【今日のレコード】MIKE OLDFIELD/Tubular Bells II

【今日のレコード】#MIKEOLDFIELD / TubularBellsII もう皆さんご存じマイク・オールドフィールド♪ 夏のお疲れも出てきそうで、まだフォーク聴くには早いかな、という時に如何かしら？😉 私は１よりもコッチの２が好きだったりします🍀 https://sorc.theshop.jp/items/90301064

地震とか台風とか、皆さん影響は大丈夫ですか？夏休みも最終盤で大変だった方も沢山いらっしゃったかと思います。そろそろ夏のお疲れも出てくる頃でしょうか！？そん���気分の時にチューブラベルズ２♪あの映画『エクソシスト』のテーマ曲として知られた１の続編です。１よりも洗練されていて聴きやすく、怖くなく！？（ハハ）ワタクシとしてはコチラの方がよく聴いていたりします。まだまだ残暑も厳しく、秋めいた音楽を聴く前にちょっとコジャレたプログレはお勧めかも。 ☆こちらの商品は携帯サイトBASEから!!商品詳細→ https://sorc.theshop.jp/items/90301064 ブログ→…

[mitjalovse]

You early success gives you the riches and even the freedom to do anything you wish, yet you keep trying to escape from that triumph to no avail, you toil your pieces. I mean, Mike Oldfield had one of the funniest careers – there are some rumours he retired, so that's why I shall be using the past tense –, if you ask me. He kept trying to run away from Tubular Bells, yet he was pulled back in to paraphrase Coppola. Still, Tubular Bells II should not be seen as a legacy sequel. Sure, he doesn't reach the original, yet look at the disc as a variation, not a continuation. Maybe that's why he sounds relaxed on the album, since he's working in the environment he's familiar with. While the latter actually served him well later on, he didn't always succeed in deploying that.

[captainhancock006]

Mike Oldfield - Tubular Bells Part II (Live at Wembley Arena, 1980)

[justlike-awoman]

Mike Oldfield's awe-inspiring classic 'Tubular Bells' (1973) is known to many for its opening theme - but there's also another, perhaps more subtle, theme hidden within the album which is worth a deeper look!

'Tubular bells' Part II has a brief interlude of a melancholy theme, played with electric guitars mimicking bagpipes.

In David Bedford's thematic analysis of 'Tubular Bells', this particular theme is identified as "Tune O: timpani, 'Scottish' tune in parallel fifths, big climax".

A notation of the theme:

From this theme several singles have been adapted by Oldfield over the years, the theme having been reworked into a more nuanced piece of its own right. All the singles contain variations of the original melody played with different instruments and in several different musical keys.

The 1974 single version opens with a beautiful pastoral oboe introduction of the melody, played by Lindsay Cooper:

And then theme is developed further into a wonderful and rich orchestral arrangement:

I highly recommend listening to the whole 'Tubular Bells' album, it is superb, as well as the successor albums Tubular Bells II and III (and the 'Tubular Bells' 50 year anniversary edition includes also 'Mike Oldfield's single')!

[thestylesindependent]

Seemingly inescapable whenever you turned on the radio last summer, Harry Styles’ As It Was was one of the biggest hits of 2022, and remains on heavy rotation today. It topped Spotify’s end-of-year list of the most popular songs, and hit number one in the US and UK.

The song was co-written by Tyler Johnson alongside Kid Harpoon and Styles himself. Johnson and Harpoon both have production credits on the track - as they do on Watermelon Sugar, another Styles mega-hit - but as Johnson explained to Music Week [Paywall] last year, the creative process behind the two songs was very different.

“[Watermelon Sugar] took a while and As It Was was more speedy, right out of the gate,” he says. “Harry was sitting on the Moog One and I liked what he was playing, so I sat down and played as he started to write the melodies and the lyrics. Tom [Hull, aka Kid Harpoon] did a half-time beat around it, we were like, ‘No, it’s not right.’ So then Tom played the double time beat, which felt very good.

In terms of harmonic structure, As It Was has been compared to a-Ha’s Take On Me. As John Mayer demonstrated during a recent live performance, the two songs share a similar chord progression - ii-V-I-IV - but As It Was has a very different, highly distinctive topline.

“I said to Harry, ‘We need a lead line’ and he just came up right away with the ‘Dah, dah, dah...’ part,” reveals Tyler Johnson. “He didn’t hesitate. Then he started writing the second verse and referring to himself in the third person. So much of this song just came from Harry’s heart. And then Tom, as he does, with this magical sense of hooks that he has, came up with the idea of doing, ‘You know it’s not the same…’ after the chorus, which I was very impressed with. That turned out to be a very smart move.”

The song came together quickly, then: “Really, the record was about where it’s at now after three or four days,” Johnson recalls. “It didn’t go through a lot of [changes], there was never anything drastic. I had a guitarist friend, Doug Showalter, add electric guitars and some transition sounds. Then we got the tubular bells - another Harry idea - and I’ve got a video of him playing those. We had Mitch Rowland come in to do some live drums. We chopped those up for the ending to give it a more bombastic feeling.”

The best thing about As It Was is just how effortless it is, how it just flows over you and gives you a good energy.

Having a real drummer, it turns out, is important for Johnson, Harpoon and Styles. “For As It Was, we were thinking 2008-2012 indie rock, MGMT, Phoenix, Passion Pit. We want to be referential and for the music to sound familiar, but our process is that we don’t do as much drum programming as live drums. That’s what people in that era were doing to make things sound big, but not too programmed. Our engineer Jeremy Hatcher really helped shape that, those drum tones are unique in pop.”

Speaking to Rolling Stone, Kid Harpoon threw another influence on As It Was into the mix: “I’m sitting there on the drums and I was like, oh, this could have a Strokes kind of vibe,” he said. However, while he acknowledges the debt that As It Was owes to other artists and songs, he also firmly believes that it has its own identity.

"You get to the end and you hear it and you go, oh, it’s got the sort of A-ha references and the Strokes references and maybe there’s a bit of Talking Heads in there and then it becomes something bigger than the sum of its parts.”

Perhaps the relaxed vibe of As It Was stems from the fact that it was recorded in the living room in the home of A&R man Rob Stringer’s house, a place conducive to chilling out, you would have thought.

“The living room was actually a very perfect size for a control room, nice and tight but kinda long,” notes Tyler Johnson. “The back of it had a couch, an upright piano and windows that looked out over some fields, and in the front we had the desk. We rented a ton of gear, all the walls were lined with preamps and compressors. Even though we were going kind of bedroom-y, Tom and I just love lots of microphones and we do live drums, analogue synthesisers, multiple guitar amps… We love that whole element to recording.”

It was Styles, it turns out, who pushed for As It Was to be his album’s lead single. A wise move, it turns out, given its subsequent success.

“The best thing about As It Was is just how effortless it is, how it just flows over you and gives you a good energy,” thinks Tyler Johnson. “It has a gentle conversation with the listener while being upbeat. It’s easy to consume, but it still has depth and Harry brings so much character to it. Really, pop is just about people living life with music to garnish it.”

[randomvarious]

Today's compilation:

Virgin's 21st Anniversary Sampler 1993 New Wave / Alternative Rock / Progressive Rock / Alternative Dance

Pretty essential listening here if you want a quick and dirty rundown of one of the most important independent record labels in the history of contemporary and popular music. Chronologically woven, this one-CD, UK-released 21st Anniversary Sampler from Virgin Records tracks the label's growth and evolution in 18 songs, beginning in 1973 with Mike Oldfield's "Tubular Bells"—which also served as the theme music for The Exorcist—and closes out in 1991, with an offering from the phenomenal and innovative electronic-new wave-synthpop group Orchestral Manouevres in the Dark. Can't say I'm too fond of the track that was chosen to specifically represent them, though.

Truth be told, billionaire business magnate Richard Branson may be a tax-evading ass who's like a baby boomer version of Elon Musk—although a lot less abhorrent in many ways—and his seemingly heartfelt desire to help rid the world of its existential crises seems to often be at odds with his own practice of hyper-capitalist entrepreneurialism, as well as his extravagant lifestyle. But still, like him or not, before there was Virgin Airways, Virgin Megastores, Virgin Mobile, and all of his other many, many ventures, the guy definitely had an ear for good music. And Virgin Records ended up marking the highly successful start of his quite absurd and sprawling business empire.

So, with this release, you definitely will not be getting a full representation of Virgin in its first 21 years, as it's missing contributions from quite a lot of people, including the Krautrock bands that fueled a lot of the label's initial success, like Can, Tangerine Dream, and Faust, and essential new wave and synthpop groups like The Human League and Culture Club too. But be that as it may, when taking on the nearly impossible task of boiling down this label to just 18 songs, this CD still definitely goes, and it really shows just how large Virgin managed to get and how impactful their roster was on music in general.

Virgin had originally started out as a relatively small enterprise, but after being able to nab such a controversial act as The Sex Pistols in '77, things only proceeded to grow from there, and they then ended up becoming quite a force for British alternative, prog, and new wave, with bands like Genesis, Madness, Simple Minds, and XTC leading the way. Following the dissipation of that era in the late 80s and early 90s, they then landed acts like Soul II Soul, Lenny Kravitz, and Enigma too, whose own early successes of "Back to Life," "Let Love Rule," and "Sadeness," respectively, showed that Branson had developed a label that had clearly been built to last and could adapt to popular music's changing and expanding landscape, all while managing to maintain a certain air of alternative coolness—despite the cringeworthy "21 year-old virgin" joke that comes along with this album itself 😒.

Highlights:

Mike Oldfield - "Tubular Bells (excerpt)" Roxy Music - "Love Is the Drug" Sex Pistols - "Pretty Vacant" XTC - "Making Plans for Nigel" Phil Collins - "In the Air Tonight" Madness - "Our House" Genesis - "Mama" Simple Minds - "Waterfront" Public Image Ltd. - "Rise" Peter Gabriel - "Sledgehammer" Soul II Soul - "Back to Life" Lenny Kravitz - "Let Love Rule" Enigma - "Sadeness"

[earlsocksiii]

it's tubular bells thursday

[hellpenis900]

playlist: you stay home to play bideo games and drink cocoa and there's no school tomorrow so you can sleep in

okay not to oust myself as a nerd or look pretentious but that's pretty much how my week has been going & This is what that's sounded like for me:

Tarkus (i. am not typing out that full title) by Emerson, Lake & Palmer

Tubular Bells (pt. i & ii)by Mike Oldfield

Supper's Ready by Genesis

Henry: Portraits from Tudor Times (i'm also not typing out that full title sorry) by Anthony Philips

IV. Autumn Sonata by Tony Banks

-

for me. when i play video games, i use that time as an opportunity to either go through albums or to listen to lengthier songs that i might not have the attention span to finish on my own, hence why this is a short list because these songs are all 10-20 minutes long

[24mirrorshards]

Watch "Salyu - Landmark" on YouTube

Read More for lyrics (JPN with romaji, ENG translation, plus an English melody-scan)

Original Japanese Lyrics

散らばってる メモリーから この世界の果てからも 意識のような 感情のような 想い達が集まったら 水銀のような モンスターのような 何かが喋り出した

chirabatteru MEMORY kara

kono sekai no hate kara mo

ishiki no you na kanjou no you na

omoitachi ga atsumattara

suigin no you na MONSTER no you na

nanika ga shaberidashita

「何に立ち向かって いったらいい 何度 悲しみ飲み込んで」 アア それはあたしだ

Ring Ring… ずっと鳴ってたんだ 警告のチューブラベル

"nan' ni tachimukatteittara ii

nando kanashimi nomikonde"

aa, sore wa atashi da

Ring Ring

zutto nattetanda keikoku no TUBULAR BELL

真っすぐだと思ってたら スパイラルを描いていた さまよっても確かめながら 手探りでも生きぬけるように 罪もゆるして 甘えないからって 涙が笑い出した

massugu da to omottetara

SPIRAL wo egaiteita

samayottemo tashikamenagara

tesaguri demo ikinukeru you ni

tsumi mo yurushite amaenai karatte

namida ga waraidashita

「みんな因果 ぜんぶ真実なら どんなものを 愛と感じるんだ?」 アア 眼を開ければ

全部 自分の中にあった 何度だって ここで 生まれていたんだ landmark

"minna inga zenbu shinjitsu nara

donna mono wo ai to kanjirunda?" aa, me wo akereba

zenbu jibun no naka ni atta

nando datte koko de umareteitanda LANDMARK

握りしめた希望のように 物語にならないメロディー 本当の声が 共鳴しているのは 嘘を剥ぎ取る誓いだ

nigirishimeta kibou no you ni

monogatari ni naranai MELODY

hontou no koe ga kyoumeishiteirunda

uso wo hagitoru chikai da

"なん に 立ち向かって いったら いい なんど かなしみ のみこんで" ああ それ わ あたし だ"

Ring Ring… ずっと鳴ってたんだ 警告のチューブラベルが きっと全部 あたしの中にあるよ ずっと

"nan' ni tachimukatteitara ii

nando kanashimi nomikonde" aa, sore wa atashi da

Ring Ring

zutto nattetanda keikoku no TUBULAR BELL ga

kitto zenbu atashi no naka ni aru yo zutto

English Translation:

When ideas like consciousness and emotion gathered

From memories scattered as far as the edges of this world

Something like mercury, like a monster spoke out

"What should I stand and face? How many times have I swallowed my sorrow?" Oh, that's me

Ring, Ring

Tubular bells rang out to warn me constantly

I thought the lines I drew were straight, but they were spirals

Even as I wander, I'll keep myself in check

Even though I fumble, it seems I will survive

Forgive my sins, for I cannot be spoiled

My tears burst out laughing

"If everyone is of consequence and everything is true,

What sort of things do you feel love for?" Oh, if I could open my eyes

Everything was inside myself all along

How many times was I born here, at this landmark?

Like the hope I clutched, this melody won't become a story

The resonance of my true voice vows to strip away lies

"What should I stand and face? How many times have I swallowed my sorrow?" Oh, that's me

Ring, Ring

Tubular bells rang out to warn me constantly

Certainly, everything is always inside of me.

English Melody Scan:

From scattered memories

From the edges of the world

I gathered up my thoughts, and something came unfurled

Like an awakening within my heart and mind

I took my first step forth, unsure of what I'd find

It looked like madness - mercurial and monstrous

And it called out a message for me

"You'd best stand and fight unless you wish to fall. When sorrow washes over you, just drink it all." That voice I heard was mine

Ring, Ring

Warning bells were chiming out inside my mind, all the time

The path I drew was straight, or so I believed

But the spirals I would walk proved that I was deceived

If I can't trust my mind, I'll wander 'til I learn

From all of my mistakes, for which I can't seem to burn

I want to repent, so don't be so indulgent

My very tears were laughing at me

"Everyone is bound by fate and all is real - now, tell me who you love and tell me how you feel." I don't know, I feel so blind

Everything I needed grew inside of me

When I get lost I'll look inside so I can see my landmark

I'm clinging on to hope so tightly that it hurts

The song inside my heart could not be put to words

I hear an echo - the sound of my true voice

Grows loud enough to strip away the lies

"You'd best stand and fight unless you wish to fall. When sorrow washes over you, just drink it all." That voice I heard was mine

Ring, Ring

Warning bells were chiming out inside my mind, all the time

Everything I need is being born in me, surely, all the time

[mondoradiowmse]

06/19/24 Mondo Radio Playlist

Here's the playlist for this week's edition of Mondo Radio, which you can download or stream here. This episode: "A House With No Door", featuring classic prog rock and more. If you enjoy it, remember to also follow the show on Facebook and Twitter!

Artist - Song - Album

Pink Floyd - One Of These Days - Meddle

Pink Floyd - Interstellar Overdrive (Live At The Paradiso 1969) - Cre/ation: The Early Years 1967-1972

King Crimson - In The Court Of The Crimson King Including The Return Of The Fire Witch And The Dance Of The Puppets - In The Court Of The Crimson King

King Crimson - 21st Century Schizoid Man Including Mirrors - In The Court Of The Crimson King

Van Der Graaf Generator - Killer - H To He, Who Am The Only One

Van Der Graaf Generator - House With No Door - H To He, Who Am The Only One

Eighth Route Army - Record Burnin' Party - Nihilist Olympics

Jethro Tull - Aqualung - Aqualung

Jethro Tull - My God - Aqualung

The Moody Blues - Question - A Question Of Balance

The Moody Blues - Melancholy Man - A Question Of Balance

Procol Harum - Simple Sister - Geatest Hits

Procol Harum - Whaling Stories - Greatest Hits

Emerson, Lake & Palmer - The Gnome (Live) - Pictures At An Exhibition

Emerson, Lake & Palmer - Toccata - Brain Salad Surgery

Yes - Close To The Edge (I. The Solid Time Of Change II. Total Mass Retain III. I Get Up I Get Down IV. Seasons Of Man) - Close To The Edge

Genesis - The Grand Parade Of Lifeless Packaging - The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway

Genesis - In The Cage - The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway

Mike Oldfield - Part One: Russian - Tubular Bells 2003

Mike Oldfield - Part One: Finale - Tubular Bells 2003

[whatilistenedtoatwork]

From April 15th to April 19th, 2024

15-04-2024

GORKY'S ZYGOTIC MYNCI “The Blue Trees”; PAUL CHAMBERS “Bass On Top”; MIKE OLDFIELD “Tubular Bells II”; THE CORAL “Coral Island”; JEAN MICHEL JARRE “En Attendant Cousteau”; BILL RYDER-JONES “Yawn”; NOODLES “Ivy”; THE KATHRYN TICKELL BAND “The Kathryn Tickell Band”; THE BREEDERS “Title TK”; DE DANNAN “Anthem”

16-04-2024

CAB CALLOWAY & HIS ORCHESTRA “Cab Calloway 1930-1931”; FAIRPORT CONVENTION “Unhalfbricking”; BUCKWHEAT ZYDECO “One For The Road”; R.E.M. “Dead Letter Office”; ERIC BOGLE “Singing The Spirit Home”

17-04-2024

THE FALL “Code-Selfish”; THE SHAGGS “Philosophy Of The World”; RICHARD THOMPSON & DANNY THOMPSON “Industry”; U-ROY “Right Time Rockers”; SARAH VAUGHAN “Sarah Vaughan Sings George Gershwin, Volume 2”; GUNS N' ROSES “Appetite For Destruction”; THE JAMES TAYLOR QUARTET “In The Hand Of The Inevitable”; DOC & MERLE WATSON “Doc & Merle Watson's Guitar Album”; SMALL FACES “There Are But Four Small Faces”; BEAUSOLEIL “Bayou Cadillac”; AVENGED SEVENOLD “Avenged Sevenfold”; THE MONKEES “Headquarters”; BUFFALO TOM “Quiet & Peace”

18-04-2024

THE BREEDERS “Pod”; ERIC B & RAKIM “Paid In Full”; CARTER THE UNSTOPPABLE SEX MACHINE “101 Damnations”; THE CURE “Faith”; GRATEFUL DEAD “Workingman's Dead”; DOLLY PARTON “In The Good Old Days (When Times Were Bad)”; BIKINI KILL “Pussywhipped”; DAVE SWARBRICK “Rags, Reels & Airs”; THROWING MUSES “Chais Changed”; CAB CALLOWAY & HIS ORCHESTRA “Cab Calloway 1937-1938”; SUDED “Bloodsports”; THE CURE “The Head On The Door”

19-04-2024

MARTIN CARTHY & DAVE SWARBRICK “Byker Hill”; SEBADOH “Bubble & Scrape”; CAN “Out Of Reach”; JEAN MICHEL JARRE “Chronologie”; UNDERWORLD “A Hundred Days Off”; THE FALL “Levitate”; TIMBER TIMBRE “Hot Dreams”; ROBYN HITCHCOCK & THE EGYPTIANS “Queen Elvis”

[krispyweiss]

Mike Oldfield is 70 Today

Mike Oldfield peaked early.

Still - and likely forever - best known for his 1973 debut, Tubular Bells, Oldfield turns 70 today.

Born May 15, 1953, Oldfield didn’t stop when his first release caught on and was featured in “The Exorcist.” In fact, he released an additional 25 albums, including 1992’s Tubular Bells II, ’98’s Tubular Bells III and 2003’s Tubular Bells 2003, and had several hits in Europe.

Though he’s reportedly retired from music, Oldfield’s legacy is set. He may not be a household name in the United States, but the mention of Tubular Bells will make any music lover’s head turn.

5/15/23

[captainhancock006]

Mike Oldfield Tubular Bells II Live From Edimburg

[sheetmusiclibrarypdf]

Tubular bells (Intro) – Mike Oldfield sheet music

Tubular bells (Intro) – Mike Oldfield sheet music Mike Oldfield The Road to Tubular Bells: 1971-1973 The Shooting Star: 1974-1975 Out of the limelight: 1976-1978 Touring Band: 1979-1984 Please, subscribe to our Library. Thank you!The Video Years: 1985-1988 Best Sheet Music download from our Library.The end of the Virgin Era: 1989-1991 The story is not over

Tubular bells (Intro) – Mike Oldfield sheet music

https://dai.ly/x8jdphe

Mike Oldfield

He was born in the city of Reading, England on May 15, 1953. His father Raymond was a doctor who had a guitar he bought while serving in the Royal Air Force in Egypt during World War II. Mike remembers how his father 'used to play the guitar every Christmas Eve, singing the only song he knew how to play, Danny Boy.' Mike also attributed his early interest in music to virtuoso guitarist Bert Weedon. 'I saw it on TV when I was seven years old and immediately convinced my father to buy me my first guitar. In fact, I think if it hadn't been for Bert I never would have become the main thing in my life.' The Oldfields became a musical family. Mike's older brother, Terry is now a renowned composer in the field of TV documentary music and already has several albums on the market. His sister Sally became a professional singer and had a hit in the early 80's with everyone known as 'Mirrors', she now calls herself Natasha Oldfield. By the age of 10, Mike was already composing instrumental pieces for acoustic guitar. The guitar was for him more than an instrument. it was an escape route from a family situation that was worsening and cutting him off from the outside world for a long time. Throughout the past decade, the acoustic music scene had been in very good health. Music was played in many of the clubs that were open during that period. It was in one of those clubs where young Mike began to realize that his musical ideas were accepted by a large majority of the public. 'He used to have two 15-minute instrumentals that he would play at the local folk clubs where he would go through all the styles,' he would say. 'He would even totally detune the strings and bend them over the neck and do all sorts of things. As soon as I got vacations from school, he would spend the whole week practicing and playing the guitar.' He also tried electronic music, him playing instrumental pieces from 'The Shadows' in an amateur band. When he was 13 years old, the Oldfield family moved to Romford in Essex. In 1967, he dropped out of school and together with his sister Sally formed Sallyangie, a folk voice and guitar duo. They were signed by the Transatlantic company, which released the album 'Children Of The Sun' in 1968 and the single 'Two Ships' in 1969. Around this time Mike's guitar playing was heavily influenced by 'baroque folk' popularized by John Renbourn, Pentangle leader and Bert Jansch. After a year, the end of Sallyangie came. Mike returned to rock music, forming another group of similar duration called Barefeet. That led to a job as a bassist with Kevin Ayers & the Whole World. Ayers was a founding member of Soft Machine but left the group in 1968. The following year they made the 'Joy Of A Toy' album which led to a tour in 1970. Among the members of the Whole World was David Bedford taking care of the keyboards. Bedford, who was a classically trained composer, struck up a good friendship with Mike, helping him compose an early version of Tubular Bells. While on tour with The Whole World, Mike came into contact with the Centipede, a huge jazz band conducted by Keith Tippett. The wide range of instruments available to them influenced Mike in the multi-instrumental character that he would later give to his own compositions. Kevin Ayers & the Whole World recorded two albums, Shooting At The Moon and Whatevershebringswesing before splitting up in August 1971. Until then Mike had been playing electric guitar and his masterful solos with Kevin Ayers had already earned him a reputation as a master. The Road to Tubular Bells: 1971-1973 During that period Mike began to order the musical ideas that would later form part of Tubular Bells. Using a four-track recorder with two tracks going one way and two tracks going the other that Kevin Ayers lent him, he discovered that if he covered the erase head with a small piece of cardboard he could record on four tracks. In this way he could begin to record the ideas necessary to realize his dream. That dream was to create a symphony, similar to the large-scale compositions for orchestra with different movements that could be found in many works of classical music. With Ayers' tape recorder he went into his bedroom in the house he shared with the other members of the group, and ideas for his new work slowly began to take shape. Already involved in the work, Mike insisted on playing all the instruments himself. And he thought that it would not be difficult for him with his natural gift to master almost any instrument; from the glockenspiel to the grand piano, the classical guitar, the Farfisa organ… . While continuing to work with Kevin Ayers, he also assisted with recordings being made at London's famous Abbey Road Studios. He soon discovered that the studio had a warehouse full of all kinds of instruments, so he would manage to arrive early and while the others arrived, he would experiment with those instruments and thus incorporate new sounds and textures into his musical ideas. Engrossed in his work, he set out to capture all the deep emotions he was experiencing at that time in his music. Either way, one would have to wonder if Mike's state of mind would have allowed him to withstand the pressure of working with other people much longer. Especially considering that what he was doing would be a job that he would gradually become a vehicle to unload his deepest emotions and those with which he was having the most trouble living. After creating a small demo, he started going through all the record labels trying to convince someone to support his project. They all gave him a resounding NO for an answer, saying that this was 'not commercial' and that if it were ever published, no one would buy it. Obviously, that had happened to him for putting his faith in that little worked model. After having composed the hypnotic introduction (the theme that would form the main part of his magnum opus after developing it), he would still remember that. If only he could have recorded, edited and promoted it! But a ray of light would illuminate his future. Mike left the Kevin Ayers band and worked occasionally as a guitarist to earn a living. One such job was in the backing band for the £5 a night London production of Hair, the 'tribal love-rock musical'. He also played bass for a time in a band led by soul singer Arthur Lewis. The group was to record at a recently opened studio in a mansion in Shipton-on-Cherwell, 20 miles from Oxford. The Manor recording studios were built for Richard Branson by Tom Newman, assisted among others by Simon Heyworth. It was a team of good friends. The girlfriends of some of them were also there to attend to them, as well as a cook, cleaners and gardeners. As Mike later commented, 'We treated any problems that came up like we were one big family.' The great atmosphere in the studio and the attitude of Newman and Heyworth gave Mike the opportunity to record a demo of his musical ideas. They both loved it. Heyworth and Newman launched a campaign to persuade Branson to edit it and to leave the studio for a while to record it. From the outset it seemed that this was not the appropriate moment. The project had to wait a bit for the arrival of Simon Draper who would join Branson to create the Virgin record company. Draper had extensive musical knowledge and when he heard Mike's ideas, he was immediately enthusiastic. Mike continued to develop and refine his ideas that he could now give a name to: Tubular Bells, although it initially carried names like Breakfast in Bed and Opus One (Opus 1). But she had almost given up hope of realizing her dream when Draper offered her a week of study time at The Manor. A wide selection of instruments was brought into the studio and work began. During that week something else of the first part was recorded, and the rest of the work during sessions spread over the following months. From the beginning Mike put the facilities that the technology of the time gave him to the limit to make his recordings. Very soon he started using 16 tracks. As more and more instruments were added to the recording, the sessions were also a test of the inventive resources of Newman and Heyworth who mixed it all together as well as they could be based on their knowledge. The studio's equipment was not automated, and all the work was done manually by Mike. Simon Heyworth and Tom Newman were already using every finger at their disposal on the mixing desk. This made the relationship between producers and artist less close, but even so, each of the three learned many things from their other two companions. During the session, Mike played over 20 instruments and approximately 2000 test tapes were recorded. The music was played almost entirely by himself, except for Viv Stanshall (Vocals), Jon Field (Flute), Steve Broughton (Percussion) and Mundy Ellis (Vocals). Tom Newman and Simon Heyworth earned credit as co-producers. When the sessions were over, Branson took the Tubular Bells tapes with him to the music industry fair, MIDEM, in Cannes in January 1973. An executive from an American company told him, 'if you put lyrics on it, I'll buy it for $20,000. '. With no one showing interest, Branson and Draper decided to release the album themselves on their new Virgin Records label. Tubular Bells was released on May 25, 1973. It came out of a recording and mixing process that could have been called art in its purest form. Critics did what they could to define it. The public simply opened their hearts to him. The press in his country was perplexed. Influential BBC radio DJ John Peel wrote that it was 'a record that genuinely covered new and uncharted territory', with music that 'combines logic with surprise, sunshine with rain'. 'A lengthy work, almost classical in its structure and in the way the theme is established and deftly worked', said the Melody Maker. Some interviewers even thought they could tell what Mike's influences were: 'The texture of Tubular Bells is quite reminiscent of Sibelius, Vaughan Williams, Michel Legrand and The Last Night Of The Proms,' wrote television producer Tony Palmer. Tubular Bells will always be remembered as a moment in rock music history that captured the hearts and imaginations of many people. It was also a starting point from which to appreciate the many changes and discoveries made by this creator who, starting at the age of 19, grew in maturity. The album entered the UK charts in July and soon reached No. 1. Tubular Bells began selling out across Europe. In June 1973, a live concert by Tubular Bells was given at the Queen Elizabeth Hall in London. Mike was joined for this occasion by guitarists Mick Taylor (of the Rolling Stones), Steve Hillage (of Gong), Fred Frith (of Henry Cow) and Ted Speight. Also taking part were David Bedford, Kevin Ayers and Pierre Moerlen, the percussionist for the avant-garde rock band Gong and who would be a fixture on Mike's band of musicians for many years. Although his appearance was announced, Stevie Winwood could not play at the end because due to certain problems she had not had much time to rehearse. The audience's response was described by a New Musical Express journalist as follows: 'The entire audience stood up and started asking for more. That was just one of those rare, spur-of-the-moment tokens of appreciation.' Tubular Bells was also released in the United States, but everything was happening more slowly there. The necessary push for the album's sales to skyrocket came when film director William Friedkin, encouraged by Richard Branson, decided to use a 4-minute excerpt in the controversial horror film The Exorcist. Mike was not consulted regarding the association of his work with that film and would later tell reporters that he had not liked it. In the UK, a Tubular Bells single was released with a remixed version of the album in a 'quadraphonic' version, a system that required four speakers for full use. To show the wonders of that new system, the Tubular Bells 'Quad' included an extra sequence of an airplane appearing to move around the listener, which was recorded after The Sailor's Hornpipe. The Shooting Star: 1974-1975 Mike Oldfield had long dreamed of the time when Tubular Bells would be released. When that happened he couldn't take the pressure and still emotionally exhausted from the recording process for Tubular Bells he retired to his new home in Herefordshire. It was there that he began creating his new work that would later take the name of nearby Hergest Ridge. Released in England in September 1974, like its predecessor Tubular Bells, this was an album containing a single theme song. Again almost all the instruments are played by Mike himself. The most talked about effect was what one reviewer called a 'electrical storm'. Other musicians who contributed to the album included Sally Oldfield and Clodagh Simmonds (vocals), June Whiting and Lindsay Cooper (oboes), and Ted Hobart (trumpet). For Mike, music composition was a constant work in progress. The symphonic scheme used in Tubular Bells was continued in a series of later works: Hergest Ridge, Ommadawn, Incantations, QE2 and Amarok. Hergest Ridge went straight to number one on the UK sales chart. Virgin Records also advertised it on television, although the slogan had to be changed for this purpose. The ad originally said the album was available from 'Virgin and other immaculate record stores'. It had to be changed for another due to the possible objections that the Catholic Church could present. Although some critics viewed Hergest Ridge as inferior to Tubular Bells, most loved it. One said it was 'The most everyday rock music with some classical symphony'. Another wrote that it was 'a series of emotional spikes exploding here and there through a tickling stillness'. In December 1974, the orchestral versions of Tubular Bells and Hergest Ridge were presented in concert at the Royal Albert Hall in London. The concert was planned by David Bedford who conducted the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra with guitar solos by Steve Hillage. Mike himself would play the guitar in the studio version of that concert, which was released in January 1975 under the name The Orchestral Tubular Bells. In that same year but a little later those same orchestral arrangements were presented in concerts in Glasgow and Newcastle. In Scotland, Steve Hillage played guitar parts with the Scottish National Orchestra, and the soloist in the North East was Andy Summers, later a member of The Police. The sense of humor that was evident in the 'introduction to the instruments' of Tubular Bells was prominently featured on Don Alfonso, a single that was released in March 1975. With the help of Chris Cutler (drums), David Bedford (vocals ) and Kevin Ayers (Wine Bottles), Mike told the story of a bullfighter who worked for Oxo ('Worked for Oxo'). In a slightly more serious direction, he released Ommadawn in September 1975. His third great work of symphonic rock had taken him nine months to record. At Ommadawn, Mike played about 20 instruments, ranging from guitars to grand piano to spinet. The album incorporated music from Africa and Ireland by way of Jabula's African percussion group and the Uilean bagpipes of Paddy Moloney, leader of the Chieftains. Other contributing artists included Terry and Sally Oldfield, members of the Hereford City Band, and recorder (a type of flute) soloist Leslie Penney. Penney also accompanied Mike on the Christmas single, a version of the traditional Christmas carol In Dulci Jubilo which managed to reach number four in the UK charts. Although many journalists hailed Ommadawn as yet another triumph, some resentment began to show in some criticism of the album by others. Perhaps influenced by the influx of rock fashion into previously retro-style pubs, one UK pop newspaper called Ommadawn 'bland and inconsequential'. An excellent background music for banquets.' Although he had not yet returned from the tour he was doing to promote that work, Mike contributed to albums by other musicians with whom he was associated. His guitar playing can be heard on records released in 1975 by David Bedford, Edgar Broughton and Tom Newman. The impact of Tubular Bells continued in 1975. In that year it was awarded a Grammy for Best Instrumental Composition and the enormous popularity that these instruments (tubular bells) were reaching led the company that manufactured them, Premier, to launch a selling a new range of rigid metal tubes. In a different vein, a reader wrote to Mayfair magazine: 'The most exciting moment of my sex life came recently when we both finally climaxed together listening to the end of Mike Oldfield's Tubular Bells.' Out of the limelight: 1976-1978 In the following years the then world famous Tubular Bells theme appeared in a disco version by the Champs Boys, a group of French studio musicians. That was almost all that was heard of Mike's music in 1976, although fans of equestrian sports did hear an excerpt from Ommadawn as an intro to the televised broadcast of the Horse Of The Year Show. Mike hid from the public for longer than he did from 1976 to 1978. He would later tell reporters that he had psychological problems and that is why he went into seclusion in the country at his home in Gloucestershire to create the music that would later be called Incantations. . To hide it from the public eye, Virgin compiled Boxed, a four-disc set containing their three albums released to date and a fourth disc containing singles, special collaborations on records by other artists, and a song sung by Mike himself called Speak (Tho ' You Only Say Farewell). Mike's only new work in 1976 was the Christmas single, Portsmouth, another traditional song arranged by Oldfield. It reached number 3, one position above that of In Dulci Jubilo. Read the full article

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