Dead Finks Don't Talk
Brian Eno
Here Come The Warm Jets
EG : 1974
Blank Frank
Brian Eno
Here Come The Warm Jets
EG : 1974
Driving Me Backwards
Brian Eno
Here Come The Warm Jets
EG : 1974
Burning Airlines Give You So Much More
Brian Eno
Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy)
EG : 1974
The Great Pretender
Brian Eno
Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy)
EG : 1974
The True Wheel
Brian Eno
Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy)
EG : 1974
Taking Tiger Mountain
Brian Eno
Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy)
EG : 1974
Sky Saw
Brian Eno
Another Green World
EG : 1975
Golden Hours
Brian Eno
Another Green World
EG : 1975
The Big Ship
Brian Eno
Another Green World
EG : 1975
Between visiting relatives and boozing with friends, I found some time to introduce myself to Brian Eno. Or, rather, his first solo three albums. I have to say, they knocked me on my ass. These songs have been on my playlist all week.
I’d heard of Eno is because I love the Talking Heads, and my favorite Heads albums all have his name in the credits. I knew a little bit about him but felt compelled to learn more, and doing some preliminary reading I found that in addition to blazing trails in the realm of ambient music, he’s had his hands in many a band’s business, successfully producing for both David Bowie and U2.
And before all that he was a glam rocker.
So here’s a sample of his first three solo works, right after he split off from Roxy Music, and before he started making exclusively instrumental ambient works. Hope you dig.
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The best part of Dead Finks Don’t Talk (besides the title) is the ending that comes out of left field. I could listen to that alone for the length of a song.
Blank Frank kicks a certifiable amount of ass and is too much fun.
Drive Me Backwards begins dissonant and uncomfortable with a detuned piano. Mid dirge the piano’s mixed down as a cool synth-y instrument takes over, switching between two notes relentlessly as electric guitar stabs echo in and out of the soundscape. The whole thing does a slow pan from organic to mechanical while Eno's wild vocals lead the audience along, like a singing mad hatter.
I can close my eyes for the first 30 seconds of The Great Pretender and, give or take a couple updated sounds here and there, easily imagine this being a Beck song. I love the detuned, spoon on pot drumming atmosphere.
Burning Airlines Give You So Much More and The True Wheel prove that no matter how far out he was going, he could still put down a good poppy tune.
If you get the chance, listen to Sky Saw, then listen to Talking Head’s Remain In Light. I knew Eno worked with the Heads big time on this album (he’s got co-writing credits across the board), but I had no idea how much of his sound had directly translated to theirs.
Taking Tiger Mountain is drifting and beautiful, while The Big Ship is one of the handful of examples from Another Green Worlds of Eno’s first dabblings with ambient music. Change the instrumentation up a bit (- guitars, - drums, update synth sound) and this track could have easily been a part of Moby’s Everything is Wrong. But it’s not. Eat it, Moby.
Golden Hours is by far my favorite song from this bunch. It hypnotizes me. I melt just after the 2:00 minute mark, where the twiddling guitar comes in. Does it to me every time.
5 comments:
fantastic selection - quibble?
i could but i won't, to do so would be without grace.
i've long been in to mr e - since the early roxy days in fact & still have half shares(a 17 yr long story) in the pre ambient solo lps (all original bought brand new at the time)...
So what?
It's good to see that the appeal hasn't been lost or worn off in any way and that people can still get it on first hearing.
or something like that??
thanks and keep up the good blog work
i
pre
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Nice to see someone agrees with me on selections from Eno.
Pop music doesn't seem to be able to handle much imagination, but still it was disappointing that Eno only reached a larger audience indirectly through producing other people's music.
The ending of Same As It Ever was was totally Eno, Talking Heads did not have that kind of creative voltage. The same is true of David Bowie's Heroes.
Anybody who can listen to The Great Pretender without mentioning that Eno is the absolute RULER of making electronic insect noises --- well -- should listen again, just for the sheer joy of the cricketty things!
Peter - Thank you for your grace. If I got something wrong though, set me straight. I'd hate to misinform.
David - Indeed
mstrwggl - Since starting my FmGT tenure, I've noticed one of the hardest parts of writing about music is describing what I hear. Dense and inventive pieces like these present even more of a challenge. 1: to describe everything in the track beginning to end would take a page, so what to highlight? 2: what the hell language can I use to describe the stabs, swirls, swells and warbles in this song that will characterize it accurately and uniquely?
Not that I'm complaining. If I didn't love trying, I wouldn't be writing about music. My point? Hell yes about the cricketty things.
Great Eno selection! After listening to The Great Pretender it occurred to me that there's a Kate Bush song--Army Dreamers, I think--that has very much the same sound.
Back in the day, I had a great Eno and Robert Fripp collaboration album called No Pussyfooting (I loaned it out and never saw it again) on which you hear loud and clear the influence Eno had on U2, particularly their The Unforgettable Fire (which he produced) and The Joshua Tree.
Thanks again for the great post!
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