Brian Eno - C or D?

1. Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy) (the only solo Eno album I am enthusiastic about in its entirety), as well as individual tracks on some of his other albums (especially Before and After Science).

2. His touch as producer on what are often the best albums of the bands he's worked with: Remain in Light, Bowie, Devo (I forgot this--using allmusic as a cheat-sheet now), etc.

3. Collaborations with: Fripp (although I would say say that Fripp carries most of the weight there--but still, I think Eno's presence counts), Jon Hassel, etc.

Etc. because I have to go.

3.

Of course, the man and the vast majority of his music, and his influence, is classic. Couldn't live without "Taking tiger mountain" or "Music for airports" amongst others. Those two boxed sets are two of the best investments I've ever made.

Plus the Obscure Music series, which has some good titles.

Its just so coool. Weird pop and ambienty bits floated against each other in the nicest way, and my four year old loves to sing "I'll come running" which has got to get him some points somewhere.

then, suddenly, like a switch being thrown...

when 'wrong way up' came out an interview disc was distributed to radio, where he's sounding and dull, then at the end he begins talking about the recent birth of his daughter and how unimportant the theoretical side of music had become to him, and how now he just wanted to relax and play tunes. which makes me happy for eno the man, but keeping up with the last decade of releases has been a punishing experience.

'spinning away' from 'wrong way up', still excellent though

"Uh-oh!"

"Ding ding!"

*I can't remember if I bought a copy or received it as a gift, but probably the latter. I used to get my older brother to buy me "weird"** records for my birthday and Christmas.

**I think he thought it was weird anyway (judging by his response to what I listened to on the radio), but I think he was a little amused to watch me growing up and getting into punk and new wave, and new bands he hadn't heard of, or other stuff that seemed esoteric to him. I think he may have bought me this album, the first Psychedelic Furs album, and Fripp's Let the Power Fall, and some a John Coltrane collection, all at my request. Now I'm getting all sentimental about my older brother. I miss being close to my family, and it's all Brian Eno's fault--well, not exactly.

Possibly the fact that I often couldn't make out the lyrics or didn't know what he was talking about contributed to my liking the songs. "With Burgundy, Tizer and Rye/Twelve sheets of foolscap: don't ask me why." I'm still largely in the dark about these lines, for example. I think I only found out what foolscap is in the last few years and I've already forgotten the details.

I kind of like the lyrics to "True Wheel." I am looking at a lyrics page now, and I find myself saying, oh, is that how it goes? I really am not even hearing what he's saying a lot of the time.

music for airports = nice but forgettable, put aside after a couple of listens.

apollo = stunningly beautiful, one of my most played albums in recent times.

with this in mind, what next?

try no pussyfooting, with fripp.

http://www.furious.com/perfect/bangseno.html

a musical genius, the godfather of Ambient, the mastermind of warm synthesis, although the cause of a lot of shit (ie damp snares in 80s music from Low) still one of the true heads!

A let me emphasize his Ambient series - i don't understand why anyone hasn't yet. On Land, man! and lets not mention the second side of Day of Radiance with Laraaji (the first side i admit being...well). Most of my feelings on Before and After Science, Another Green World have meen mentioned.

And on a last note, My Life in the Bush of Ghosts is fucking ingenius record :)

seriously, listen to the title track from Taking Tiger Mountain or the first track on Warm Jets and get back to me, you will be a convert y0.

My neighbors must wonder what's up when they walk by my apartment door and hear me playing music with English lyrics.

It is the only 70's eno record I do not care for. I just felt the production was not quite up to snuff, he polished it too much. Everything Eno did no that record he did better on previous albums. I found it funny that I did not care for the record, and unbeknownst to me Eno actually echoed my complaints when he discussed that record in interviews in the late 70's.

It isn't a horrible record, it is just that he has a lot of material from that period of time and your money is better spent elsewhere in the back catalogue. And while I am thinking about it, you should probably pick up Cluster and Eno because that it good stuff.

Also, has anyone ever heard that the live The 801 bootleg from 76?

"I'm terribly attracted to women with ocular damage."

Classic.

On the "JCS3" tip...

an immaculate cover of his old collaborator Nico, “I’m Set Free,”

I'm Set Free is from the decidedly Nico-free self-titled VU album. Sloppy things happening in this article!

*self-titled third VU album

it’s Brian emo, not eno. Big misspell and it happens throughout

Lol

that write-up was a boring excuse to go over his entire story for the 100th time.

also, was Nico really one of Eno's old collaborators? Not really. they did that 1974 concert and he did some sounds on the End.

also, the artists on that June 74 album all play with different bands, not together iirc

The intro to eno stuff was boring for those of us who know the story - maybe not so much though for the ringer audience. I was more interested in the write up of his recent shows.

eno’s slippery relationship to live performance is definitely interesting to me. not mentioned in that article are the Pure Scenius shows that happened in Sydney and the UK & which were an interesting if not always successful attempt to put some of his systems thinking and penchant for conceptual conceits into the live arena.

the sydney show was 3 two hour concerts featuring Karl Hyde, The Necks, Jon Hopkins, Leo Abrahams and Eno himself sending directions to different musicians at different times and occasionally playing keyboard and doing spoken word. some bits were definitely better than others but it was a cool thing to see and did feel true to his practice overall.

not to pile on (because good for the Ringer for featuring Eno) but . . . U.K. music magazine Trouser Press????????

It’s the Suffolk. (Population, 5000) which made me roll my eyes. Only 755,000 short.

yea was gonna say for a town of 5000 I've heard an awful lot about it

We revive this thread a day after I downloaded the '93 box set.

Box set has some essential rarities but an otherwise erratic track list. Most/much of each album, but, mysteriously, not all.

I DL'ed for the My Squelchy Life material, none of which is essential.

My Squelchy Life was officially released with the reissue of Nerve Net, iirc.

Under is one of my favorite Eno tracks.

"The Harness" is great too

yeah I recommend just getting My Squelchy Life, it's a very good album and good companion to Nerve Net even with the duplicated stuff.

That Sydney show sounds amazing; will have to look for some recordings of that

box set is the easy place to get Seven Deadly Finns though

And Lion Sleeps Tonight. But not his cover of Ring of Fire. Is that on the Wrong Way Up reissue? I think the only Eno vocal rarity I've never heard, afaict, is a cover of White Light/White Heat.

I didn't know he did either of those (ring of fire/white light), off to slsk.

Yeah ring of fire is on wrong way up reissue, it’s sort of in the style of the river from that album

I think that VU cover may have been recorded for charity, with one copy made. Eno said whoever bought it can release it, but so far nada.

yeah i can't find it online anywhere

I only got the Wrong Way Up reissue on vinyl so this was a nice surprise.

I was delighted when a local dealer/friend bpught a collection including a pristine "Seven Deadly Finns" single, no pic sleeve but he sold it to me for like ten bucks. the b-side "Later On" is an edit of "No Pussyfooting" that afaik has never been reissued.

“Seven Deadly Finns” never fails to crack me up.

I might have misread, but I could have sworn I just saw that the Eno documentary is generative, and shuffles or reorders itself every time you watch it.

which one?

New doc, just premiered at Sundance.

https://variety.com/2024/film/reviews/eno-review-brian-eno-sundance-1235876569/

I had a really tough day, just a fucking flailing everything-is-20x-as-hard-as-it-needs-to-be-because-my-brain-is-wired-wrong day. Eventually I stopped trying to do anything productive because everything I tried to do devolved into fiasco, and sitting with Mrs HD talking after, we listened first to Apollo and then to Discreet Music, and it was just so thoroughly healing, exactly what I needed.

<3

I listen to the 1-hour An ending (ascent) in loop whenever I'm anxious, it helps me so much

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=alo3KFRfLvE

best bit from the article: https://www.theringer.com/music/2023/12/26/24014289/brian-eno-tour-career-retrospective

Eno has a cold that won’t quit.

you think he has it bad, you should see frank sinatra!

I just wish there was a Nico version of I’m Set Free.

Was listening to the Kinks this morning, and it suddenly clicked that "Lazy Old Sun" reminded me of something that could have been on "Here Come the Warm Jets"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnXjxtfKFDM

Six-degrees-ing it a little, there are some other Kinks connections. Eno et al. covered "You Really Got Me" with 808:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6-S6d_JJOPo

And then, allegedly, Lou Reed once called "Lazy Old Sun" his favorite Kinks song, which is another loose connection to Eno (as VU acolyte).

The song also reminds of stuff like the Tall Dwarfs, too, who themselves sometimes remind me of early Eno.

Lazy Old Sun is seriously druggy. I totally get the Dwarfs/Eno thing. Slippery vocal?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9D2BJ5tv8o

The reminiscing in twilight years reminds me a bit of Bowie's Where Are We Now

Lovely. I wish that nerd would sing more.

love it, I too wish he hadn't taken so much time off from doing vocal records

Eno says he doesn't think he can sing that well but I dunno, he's better than a number of his contemporaries I feel

aaaaaaah how can I get this in FLAC/lossless??

It's included in the doc soundtrack, which is out in April