Mike Oldfield - Tubular Bells
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Music CD Cover
Artist: Mike OldfieldEdition: Music CD
CD Release Date: 1992-06-29
Music Label: Virgin Records Us
Soundtracks:
- Part One
- Part Two
Free Music Notes for Tubular Bells
Free Music Review: This has nothing to do with the movie, as intended, anyway.
Hit: 5 Stars
Mike Oldfield probably owes his career to film director Billy Friedkin, who doesn't even like "Tubular Bells" very much, and who has never even met Oldfield, for that matter. While the 1973 smash film "The Exorcist" was in its final stages of production, suitable music wasn't yet selected, as nothing seemed to fit the mood of the piece. It was either too much bombast, or too cliche'd, never quite right. The then unknown record company called Virgin Records had some music in their vault, so Friedkin was listening to some of their unknown material, looking for something the public hadn't heard before, and something with an eerie, almost child's music box sound. He found "Tubular Bells" to be very boring and pointless, to paraphrase, but the opening motif was exactly what he wanted. Whether by association in hindsight, or just the way people think, the piano intro, with the other arrangements (bass, and keyboard and percussion accents) carries this other-worldly feel, something sinister and forboding, a tension that very few other pieces have ever achieved successfully. And the rest is history. This is Mike Oldfield's first official release, and the first of several incarnations of this piece. It seems he was always trying to find the right way to communicate this idea.
Remarkable is the fact that he played all the instruments himself, save for some of the voices, a flute arrangement, and the drums. Yes, it is self-indulgent, but that is often the best performance art. Knowing if one puts his or her all into something, and has the talent to do it, it WILL be good. The listener is transported from the ominous opening theme to a lighter dimension, a postcard-like image to a hillside occupied with a small town on a late Autumn dusk or dawn. I am imposing my own mind's eye on you here, but this is what I experience with it. This is very subjective, everyone will have their own experience, so pushing my personal images off on others could taint someone else's view. I will try to keep this to a minimum. Various themes play out, some sounding more finished than others, but the segue is as much an instrument as the actual instruments themselves.
The first act, if you will, climaxes with a repetitive rhythm from an electric bass or muted electric six-string guitar, laying down an established groove, if you will, adding a new instrument each time. The instruments are introduced one at a time by Vivian Stanshall of the Bonzo Dog Band ("I'm The Urban Spaceman"), until the creshendo is reached with "...Plus; Tubular Bells!..." The bottom the falls out, and a moment of silence ensues.
In the old days, this would be where you would go get a drink and flip the record over.
Act Two, I believe, contains an opening sequence which is every bit as ominous as the piano theme Friedkin used in his movie. The first reworking of it has this passage titled "Weightless," and that is fitting there, but in this original 1973 record, it is simply frightening. Instead of playing standard guitar notes, a technique called "fretboard harmonics" is used to lay down the groundwork as nylon and steel string guitars play the melody over top, accentuated with female (or male falsetto) vocals chanting some ethereal melody you would hear in a fever-induced dream. Once again, my own lexicon trumps the readers' perception, unless they have a powerful one of their own, but dark, gritty, monochrome black-and-white imagery of bare trees and something simply being not right pervades. This gives way to a more peaceful, gentle mood, actually sounding a little sad, with an innocence to it, completely belying what preceded it.
...relax for a few moments...
Once again, this soundscape is painted with bold strokes, as distorted guitars sounding like bagpipes swirl over tympani, playing some foreboding melody in a loop, while some mis-shapen ogre is pursuing you. A plodding rock rhythm is the background for an interesting vocal by Oldfield himself, the "Piltdown Man," as the credits say. Primal rage is building, and the terrifying howl that ensues actually put a cold chill down my back the first time I heard it. This segment is one of the most aggressive pieces in most record collections from the era, a genuinely scary performance.
Screams, howls, violence, and rage, give way to quiet darkness; points of light in the distance, a la early Pink Floyd, trailing off into oblivion, but a little postscript is appended to the very end, a little sea shanty, if you will, a reminder to not take it TOO seriously, it's just a piece of music.
And, what a good piece of music it is.
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