Hergest Mike Oldfield

Released as another lengthy composition, Hergest Ridge was the album that followed Mike Oldfield's momentous Tubular Bells release, with many of the same instrumental elements and methods employed throughout its two sections…

This 2010 Deluxe Edition features versions of the original record, remastered for a modern audience, unheard demo versions, plus the mixes found on the vinyl version first released in 1974 - along with DVD footage to accompany both parts of Hergest Ridge.

This 2010 Deluxe Edition features versions of the original record, remastered for a modern audience, unheard demo versions, plus the mixes found on the vinyl version first released in 1974 - along with DVD footage to accompany both parts of Hergest Ridge.

Released as another lengthy composition, Hergest Ridge was the album that followed Mike Oldfield's momentous Tubular Bells release, with many of the same instrumental elements and methods employed throughout its two sections. Because of the time of its release, Hergest Ridge was overshadowed by the effects of Oldfield's first album for Virgin, but even so he manages to invoke some interesting patches of music by using instruments like the glockenspiel, sleigh bells, the Lowrey organ, oboes, and a variety of mandolins and guitars to maintain the same type of diversity as Tubular Bells. Symphonic throughout most of the album's two parts, the highlight of Hergest Ridge is Oldfield's use of 90 multi-tracked guitars clustered together to create one of the most unique sounds ever to surface on his albums…

Released as another lengthy composition, Hergest Ridge was the album that followed Mike Oldfield's momentous Tubular Bells release, with many of the same instrumental elements and methods employed throughout its two sections. Because of the time of its release, Hergest Ridge was overshadowed by the effects of Oldfield's first album for Virgin, but even so he manages to invoke some interesting patches of music by using instruments like the glockenspiel, sleigh bells, the Lowrey organ, oboes, and a variety of mandolins and guitars to maintain the same type of diversity as Tubular Bells. Symphonic throughout most of the album's two parts, the highlight of Hergest Ridge is Oldfield's use of 90 multi-tracked guitars clustered together to create one of the most unique sounds ever to surface on his albums…

A few years back Gonzo released the original soundtrack for Tony Palmer's "The Space Movie" 1979 documentary by Mike Oldfield. It consisted of consists of the un-edited sountrack (movie commentaries and all) which includes pieces from Oldfield's released "Tubular Bells", "Hergest Ridge", "Ommadawn" and "Portsmouth" and also excerpts from what was Oldfield's then-new album, "Incantations". The film also made use of the orchestral arrangements of Oldfield's first two albums, "The Orchestral Tubular Bells" and notably "The Orchestral Hergest Ridge" (with the Royal Philarmonic Orchestra), which has never been released before. And now… The demos.

Mike Oldfield is a bit of an enigma. On the one hand is the artist who almost single-handedly ushered in the genre of new age music with his epic masterpiece Tubular Bells, and then followed that with several albums, Hergest Ridge, Ommadawn, and even Tubular Bells II and III, all with tracks that invariable meandered for half an hour or more through various musical ideas and soundscapes – and no doubt would have gone on a lot longer had it not been for the constraints of vinyl and the restrictions on the length of musical compositions that would physically fit on two sides of a piece of plastic with micro grooves…