Tubular Bells

Tubular Bells II is the update and/or sequel to Mike Oldfield's landmark 1973 new age recording Tubular Bells, which will resonate forever as the haunting theme to The Exorcist. Here, Oldfield repeats his multi-instrumental performance, playing guitar, banjo, organ, percussion, mandolin, and the titular tubular bells, although in a nod to modernism, the latter instruments often appear as samples through Oldfield's Kurzweil synth rig. It's the piece's captivating main theme that again takes center stage here. The eight-minute opening track "Sentinel" plays it off of whining guitars and breathy female vocals. The latter element is a nice touch. The genre that the original Bells helped establish has come quite a ways in 20 years, and this fact isn't lost on Oldfield…

The video is a full faithful performance from the premiere concert of the Tubular Bells III album at Horse Guards Parade, London and was released by Warner Music…

It was inevitable, after the mega-success of Tubular Bells in its original form, that someone would orchestrate the piece - the many and varied instrumental voices of the original virtually begged for this treatment, especially as the original album appeared at the height of the progressive rock boom, when even self-contained rock bands such as Emerson, Lake & Palmer were starting to turn toward orchestral accompaniment in their quest for richer sounds. In this case, it was composer Mike Oldfield himself who oversaw and co-produced the work with orchestrator and collaborator David Bedford, a longtime friend and colleague. The orchestration lives up to its promise, Bedford bringing to bear the diverse voices of strings, horns, brass, and winds in suitably rich fashion…

Mike Oldfield's groundbreaking album Tubular Bells is arguably the finest conglomeration of off-centered instruments concerted together to form a single unique piece. A variety of instruments are combined to create an excitable multitude of rhythms, tones, pitches, and harmonies that all fuse neatly into each other, resulting in an astounding plethora of music. Oldfield plays all the instruments himself, including such oddities as the Farfisa organ, the Lowrey organ, and the flageolet. The familiar eerie opening, made famous by its use in The Exorcist, starts the album off slowly, as each instrument acoustically wriggles its way into the current noise that is heard, until there is a grand unison of eccentric sounds that wildly excites the ears. Throughout the album, the tempos range from soft to intense to utterly surprising, making for some excellent musical culminations.