Mike Oldfield - Return to Ommadawn (20th Jan 2017)

We finally have a date, cover art and a short clip for Mike's new album:

Video is in here, I'm unable to link it to the forum directly:

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I'm not sure what to think. This 30 seconds sounds kind of cheesy new-agey, sub-Voyager to me, and the cover art is horrid.

Mind you, it can't be any worse than Man on the Rocks, can it? Can it?

 

Extract playing on BBC Radio 2 now!

 

Nice! The extract was 3:28 long, and had three parts - one pipe organ/rhythm guitar bit, a nice Gaelic chanting moment that recalls the original, and a searing guitar solo...all have a vintage 70s Oldfield feel to them.

Encouraging

 

Have a search for Steve Wright in the Afternoon show in a few hours on BBC iPlayer.

 

Does it sound like a new piece, or is it (like TB2) the original played sideways?

 

According to the pre-order site, the bonus DVD will include a 5.1 mix.

 

My stupid boss decided to call me at the exact time that it started playing so I'll have to go back and check it later!

 

A bit of both.

 

Listened to the first 30 seconds of the clip they played on Radio 2 and it sounded like a bad Shadows cover on cheesy keyboards.

Quickly shut it off in case I totally put myself off listening to it at all - I don't think hearing all these little clips will do it justice.

 

Sounding a bit like The Shadows is never a bad thing in my book

 

I quite like that album...

 

To be fair, this I love...

 

Maybe I need to give it another shot. For me it's 10 times worse than Earth Moving or Heaven's Open...

 

We can't all like everything. I know it's not his masterpiece but some songs have grown on me. I also like Mike's 'pop' side. My copy is the deluxe edition with the demo versions sung by Mike himself. I play that more often than the main album!

 

Maybe that's what it would take to get me enjoying it... there's something I like a lot about the "honesty" of Mike's own vocals on "Heaven's Open" (and I, too, like his pop side, just not this collection of songs so much...)

 

That first 30 seconds sounds an awful lot like "Telstar"

 

I love this:

1. Return to Ommadawn (Part one) – 21:10
2. Return to Ommadawn (Part two) – 20:57

This is the first time since Incantations that Mike went back to his original Lp structure form of just one piece a side. Even the many Tubular Bells sequels were chopped in "tracks".
Not this time, it seems.

 

BBC Radio 6 Music - Shaun Keaveny, Have you ever been sick on yourself? »

Includes interview and clips

 

I agree, when I first heard just the "official" version of the album it was a huge disappointment save for a song or two. But once I heard the third disc demo version it was so much better that it really had me shaking my head in disbelief that he had essentially sabotaged his own album. I'll take the instrumental version over disc one too.

Not being a Facebook user the link won't allow me to hear the sample posted.

 

It's here somewhere (07/12/16)

BBC Radio 2 - Steve Wright in the Afternoon »

 

I watched the five minute interview clip on the BBC site, but the new album clips were so brief there is no way to tell what it is actually like. I was under the impression that the Facebook posting was all music sample and not interview talk. Both links are the same thing then?

 

I won't judge a whole album by a 30 sec snippet. I am really excited by this news. A new album by one of my favorite artist... WOW. I can't wait...

 

I can't find it in there. Maybe being surprised with what we get has more merit under these circumstances.

 

Many of the listings of the two disc set are showing the binding as CD+DVD-Audio. Mike's DE series has changed along the way, starting off with only 448 Kbps DD 5.1 and with Crises/Five Miles Out adding 1.509 Mbps dts 24/96...so perhaps he's bumped it up again to full lossless MLP? Above the barcode it also states DVD-Audio.

Hard to imagine both marketing would gaffe on the artwork AND several websites would have the format wrong, fingers crossed this is indeed DVD-Audio.

 

It would be wiser to make it hybrid. Just sayin'.