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@AC1

Whoa, Alex! You saw him on the EXPOSED tour?! Did you manage to get hold of any of those paper darts, that were flying around?

 

 

3 hours ago, Sweeping Strings said:

Pretty sure if Virgin had thought it was still a 'saleable' album at that stage, they wouldn't have struck the deal with the paper. 

Apparently, TUBULAR BELLS still sells 100,000 copies per year, worldwide.

I think Virgin used it as a loss leader.

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1 hour ago, Naïve Old Fart said:

@AC1

Whoa, Alex! You saw him on the EXPOSED tour?! Did you manage to get hold of any of those paper darts, that were flying around?

 

 

It was my first live concert and all I remember is that the drummer (Pierre Moulin, I think) constantly ran from his drum set to the vibraphone and back. 

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3 hours ago, Naïve Old Fart said:

There are, in fact (not counting re-releases, and "best-of"s) six TBs:

TUBULAR BELLS 1973

THE ORCHESTRAL TUBULAR BELLS 1975

TUBULAR BELLS II 1992

TUBULAR BELLS III 1998

THE MILLENNIUM BELL 1999

TUBULAR BELLS 2003 

 

Is the 2003 remake worth checking out? I've been meaning to, but never got around to it, and I'm never quite sure if I'll like Cleese as the MC. Aside from that and The Millennium Bell (how's that?), I have the rest. There's also an arrangement of TB for two pianos, although that strangely only covers part one.

 

I first became familiar with TB II and III through the live recordings released on DVD, and I think those still remain my preferred versions.

 

3 hours ago, Naïve Old Fart said:

Yes, these are both great. I'd add AMAROK to that list. PLATINUM currently resides at #4 on my all-time top-10 Oldfield favourites.

 

I don't know that one yet.

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You've not heard AMAROK? Branson wanted to name it TUBULAR BELLS II, but Oldfield felt that it was more in the vein of a sequel to OMMADAWN. It did nothing, when first released, but I love it.

The 2003 remake is, certainly, cleaner than the original, but it's all a bit clinical, for my liking.

John Gordon Sinclair trying to play the guitar is funny.

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19 hours ago, Marian Schedenig said:

 

Yes - imagine my surprise when I first heard it without knowing about that. I like all three TBs, though they're very different (and I wouldn't call any of them entirely "mellow"). If you're looking for mellow "later" (not so much from a current day perspective) Oldfield, I'm partial to Songs of Distant Earth. Big fan of Platinum, too, though again it's less mellow than the other albums Fart mentions.


I meant 'mellow' in comparison to the Foo Fighters and Royal Blood albums I listened to before it. 

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Randomly revisited Robert Plant's 2017 album Carry Fire last night and again this morning and man that is a great album.  I think it's taken over 2nd place in my favorite Plant solo albums.  I have tried to get into 80s/90s Plant albums many times over the years and just can't do it, every album is either boring or embarrassing.  The two Krauss collaborations are nice listens but non-essential.

 

So here's my ranking of the Plant solo albums I care about.  All of these are good to great!  #2 and 3 are really a tie in my mind right now.

 

1. Dreamland

2. Carry Fire

3. Mighty Rearranger

4. Lullaby and the Ceaseless Roar

5. Band of Joy

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Just now, Naïve Old Fart said:

No love for PICTURES AT ELEVEN and THE PRINCIPLE OF MOMENTS, Stu?

MANIC NIRVANA is pretty decent.

 

I've tried, I really have, and with an open mind.  I just can't get into it.  It was only once he discovered the weird psych-Americana-world-music-folk style he's been pursuing the past 20 years that I get interested.

 

As far as I'm concerned the best thing Plant did in the 80s was his appearance on Pop Quiz ;) 

 

 

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5 minutes ago, GerateWohl said:

New Divine Comedy album is out! And it looks like Neil Hannon has finally become... old.

 

You can tell Neil loved writing every stupid phrase and tortuous rhyme in that one. I’m sure my copy won’t arrive today (Guernsey post…) but looking forward to it. Apparently someone who got their copy early said there are some unreleased gems on the third disc. 

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39 minutes ago, Tom Guernsey said:

You can tell Neil loved writing every stupid phrase and tortuous rhyme in that one. I’m sure my copy won’t arrive today (Guernsey post…) but looking forward to it. Apparently someone who got their copy early said there are some unreleased gems on the third disc. 

Yes there are. Listening to it on Spotify I thought, irony and cynism seem to have won over musical interest. But I might be wrong.

 

It is more comedy and less divine.

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Was at an Alzheimers Society fundraising gig last night (and yes, to save any obvious jokes being made ... I remembered to go). An acoustic covers duo, a rock covers band and an AC/DC tribute band (half of whom admittedly were from the covers band, lol) for 15 quid ... was a good night.

 Open photo


May be an image of 6 people, people playing musical instruments and people standing

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thumbnail_ForFree_Cover_1000x.jpg

 

Yes, there's the Donald Fagen contribution but the whole CD is good. In fact, I like it better than new Steely Dan or new Donald Fagen solo albums. Can't get the music out of my head for about a week now. And while we're on the subject I didn't know Crosby was a huge Steely Dan fan. His favorites are Aja and The Royal Scam which are pretty much my favorites too even though I like Katy Lied and Gaucho just as much. 

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Why is everyone going on about Steely Dan here? I think I've heard one or two songs, but I never connected with it. Crosby is good, though, but always only heard him with Stills and Nash. Is his solo music like that?

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13 hours ago, Thor said:

Crosby is good, though, but always only heard him with Stills and Nash. Is his solo music like that?

 

It's where I know him from too. It's not really the same as Crosby, Stills, Nash (& Young) but there's definitely a hint of it on this album (his love for vocal harmony, for instance). Listening for the first time (!) to Crosby solo made me realize that, of these four guys, he's the one that I actually like the most. There's a little bit of Michael McDonald, Steely Dan, Christopher Cross and Joni Mitchell in it. I checked his previous solo album too and, wow, I feel kind of embarrassed that I never followed his solo career. He seems to be my kind of artist.

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So strange. It's a Top 10 all-time stream hits of 1975 but I only know  ...

 

You're No Good - Linda Ronstadt

Some Kind Of Wondeful - Grand Funk

Big Yellow Taxi - Joni Mitchell

 

I guess most of these songs were only hits in the US but not world hits.

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Isn't making a top 10 out of streaming statistics a bit like a list of 10 songs most often played on the radio? Sure, not quite, because some people deliberately stream playlists of individual tracks, but overall I'd assume you're at the mercy of playlist generation algorithms? Which then may end up using those "most streamed" lists as training input for their heuristics and play those songs even more frequently simply because they've already been played so often.

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Oh and to circle back to the Steely Dan talk from a few days ago, if you're talking about groups that sound like Steely Dan I'll put in a word for early 80s Manhattan Transfer.  It's definitely cheesier without the trademark Fagen acidity, but in terms of being immaculately produced jazz pop it's top notch.  And actually Fagen later gave them a song they recorded in the 90s.

 

This track has Steve Gadd on drums and Steve Lukather plays on it too.

 

This is the song from the early 90s that Donald Fagen wrote

 

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I once liked a Mahattan Transfer hit (don't remember which one), bought the CD, was disappointed with the rest of the album, so I got rid of it. I don't know if "cheesy" is the right word, but there's something about their approach, their style, their vibe, that 's not for me.

 

 

Good news for the fans of Michael Rutherford's Smallcreep's Day:

 

 

To be honest, it's not something I listen to anymore but I remember I loved this album back then. Apparently it's in this youtuber's all time Top 3. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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A reissue of this is most welcome. I bought it on vinyl, then as a "mid price" CD (£8.99? Mid price, my ass!), then in a paper sleeve, at the Genesis Twickenham concert (sounds slightly better than the mid price, but not much).

Two gripes:

1/ there's no 5.1 mix (as is the case with many Banks, and Phillips, releases)

2/ the track Compression (B side of Working In Line) has not been included.

 

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4 hours ago, AC1 said:

I once liked a Mahattan Transfer hit (don't remember which one), bought the CD, was disappointed with the rest of the album, so I got rid of it. I don't know if "cheesy" is the right word, but there's something about their approach, their style, their vibe, that 's not for me.

I think, originally they were a pure accapella group and that's where their strength is. Their albums are fairly overproduced. But I heard, they were a great live band.

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It was a joke.  People who dislike the Aja/Gaucho era like to say the those albums are airless and over-produced/fussy.  I love everything Fagen has ever done, but I do think Aja/Gaucho are the peak masterpieces.  So I was just making a joke that when someone calls something over-produced, a Steely Dan fan would interpret it as a compliment.

 

Nevermind.

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On 21/02/2022 at 5:24 PM, Naïve Old Fart said:

A reissue of this is most welcome. I bought it on vinyl, then as a "mid price" CD (£8.99? Mid price, my ass!), then in a paper sleeve, at the Genesis Twickenham concert (sounds slightly better than the mid price, but not much).

Two gripes:

1/ there's no 5.1 mix (as is the case with many Banks, and Phillips, releases)

2/ the track Compression (B side of Working In Line) has not been included.

 

 

 

So funny.

 

The enthusiastic youtuber: It's my favorite album of all time!!!!

Ant: Hmm, I can't remember the songs, to be honest.

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Yes, proggies hate the Linndrum on Steve Hackett's Cured (1981) but I loved it. I always thought Nick Magnus' programming was pretty incredible, as if done by a real drummer. And when later Ian Mosley was asked to be the drummer for the tour, he was actually very impressed with it as well.

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For a reason or another, I've decided to dig into Enya's discography this morning.

 

Enya - Watermark (1988)

Enya - Shepherd Moons (1991)

Enya - Dark Sky Island (2015)

 

:wizard:

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In fact, in the last days, I revisited some very good Roy Orbison albums I don't listen to "enough". 

 

We are just after the glorious "Monument" period... After the hits, after Oh, Pretty Woman (1964), and before the luminous and posthumous comeback album "Mystery Girl" released in 1989 (Orbison died in december, just two months before the release of this album).

 

Roy Orbison - King of Hearts (Virgin, 1992, posthumous, 80's master sessions and demos made together by Jeff Lynne)

Roy Orbison - The Orbison Way (MGM, 1966)

Roy Orbison - There is Only One Roy Orbison (MGM, 1965)

 

Roy orbison - king of hearts.jpg

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I have a weirdly lucid memory of my first week at university (2005) accidentally taking an afternoon nap with this CD in the boom box and this song on repeat.   It was one of those naps where you spend like an hour somewhere between actually asleep and awake so I remember the song took on this surreal feeling for me.

 

Anyway, great classic 4AD shoegaze, Pale Saints are

 

 

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