Mike Oldfield’s 1975 album Ommadawn got shown the door at my house faster than farting Uncle Sandy and his vomiting dog.
I got a quadraphonic pressing of the awful thing on a whim a year or so ago when I still had a fishing-net approach to collecting quad albums. I’ve learned to become much more selective. Maybe even do the simple things like make sure the album isn’t repellent first.
Fool me once, shame on Oldfield. Fool me twice, shame on me.
This was the multi-instrumentalist’s third album — two years after his breakthrough debut with 1973’s Tubular Bells. I don’t care for that album either, apart from the first four minutes of it. I honestly don’t know what possessed me to get Ommadawn. My copy was still in the shrinkwrap, which should have been a clue. As though the loathsome pretension within required some sort of impermeable barrier to keep people safe. Another clue: Just like Tubular Bells, it only has basically one song: Ommadawn Part 1 and 2.
There are more ominous warnings found in the album’s liner notes. Specifically the many listed instruments you’re about to be subjected to; Glockenspiel, banjo, pan pipes, bagpipes, timpani and even — no shit — recorders. Plural.
Oldfield’s previous album Hergest Ridge was a flop, so he made a concerted effort to make Ommadawn a return to form. He convinced Virgin Records to set him up at home with a 24-track studio and he spent the better part of 1975 recording the album — with himself as composer, engineer and producer. Two factors led to the long period of recording. First, Oldield’s mother passed away, and then issues with tape deterioration forced him to entirely re-record the first half of the album.
Oldfield wanted the lyrics of Ommadawn to be primarily musical rather than have any sort of message or poetic structure. He was interested in the sound of them. These days, Icelandic band Sigur Rós achieve this by writing and singing songs in a non-language. Oldfield’s approach was to have a friend write down the first words that came into her head. These were then translated into Irish and used as lyrics.
The album opens with a pretentious ye olde folk suite, with weird synth bass underneath and slightly Satanic “ahhhh ahhh ahhh” choral voices. This slips into more synth bass — heavier and brooding with an ultra-prog guitar solo. The next transition brightens things up and we finally get some percussion — a flutey march. Oh, I hate this stuff so much.
But then the music starts to crest a bit and shows promise with a well-mixed, rising acoustic guitar progression. It seems to be building to something cool, but… nope. This immediately stops dead and we’re treated to a recorder jig, right out of Spinal Tap’s Stonehenge. I think this is where I bailed on the record the first time I tried to listen to it in the car before I even got the quad copy home. This is definitely music for curly shoes, hides, riddles and flasks.
As the flute jig winds down, the music simmers down and gets gentler — still curly-shoe quest music, but now it feels like there’s babies, maidens and children around. Ugh.
Then there’s a lullaby thing with harp and more prog electric guitar soloing. I will say that Mike is an excellent guitarist. Reminds me of Steve Hackett. This then transitions into an African beat and we hear those nonsense Irish lyrics:
“Ab yul ann idyad awt
En yab na log a toc na awd
Taw may on omma dawn ekyowl
Omma dawn ekyowl.”
These actually translate into:
“Daddy’s in his bed
The cat’s drinking the milk
I’m the singing idiot
Singing idiot.”
The melody of this is actually rather good. The first side then crests and ends with guitar soloing, fading into more African drums. Loads of them. I believe these drums are the only thing which couldn’t be recorded at Oldield’s home, because they were too plentiful and large.
Because I’m a committed professional, I’ll continue on to Side 2. It begins with a fairly nice synth-layers overture, which actually has a cool tape-speed adjustment thing going on.This goes on for five minutes or so before transitioning into a pretty acoustic guitar section. It’s quite good, tasteful and well-played, over top of a simple synth bed. But it soons gets stupid with the introduction of bagpipes. I’m out.
So that nice acoustic section only lasted a minute or so, and then the bagpipes — Uilleann pipes, Northumbrian smallpipes or whatever fuck they are — go on for three minutes. It gets no better afterwards, when a medieval-sounding prog pastiche thing starts up before a rather triumphant-sounding progression for few refrains. This is also quite brief, giving way to a mandolin-led, clap-your-elfin-hands section. This is LARPing music, with a face-melter guitar solo overtop to boot. Who writes music like this?
Suddenly everything stops and we’re treated to the “on horseback” section — but not before a stupid spoken-word bit. Picture pastoral acoustic guitar and these words being spoken:
“I like beer, and I like cheese
I like the smell of a westerly breeze
But I like more than all of these
Is to be on horseback.”
And then sung:
“Hey and away we go!
Through the grass, across the snow
Big brown beastie, big brown face
I’d rather be with you than flying through space.”
Christ on a cracker. I just can’t. I need a shower, or to be set on fire.
Somehow this abominable album got to No. 4 in the U.K. It actually went gold there in just two months. There’s been a remaster and 5.1 remix — and even a sequel, 2017’s Return To Ommadawn.
Just like a Labrador can find the one dead fish on a sprawling beach, Virgin managed to find something to issue as a single from Ommadawn. Double-sided, no less.
I swear to gawd this is the description. Imagine this as an elevator pitch: “(The A-side) features an instrumental version of the German traditional Christmas carol In Dulci Jubilo — Oldfield’s second version of the song following an earlier recording released as the B-side to his previous single. The B-side, On Horseback, is the final and previously untitled section to Ommadawn (Part Two).”
Imagine that coming on the jukebox right after Popcorn by Hot Butter.
1/5
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Area Resident is an Ottawa-based journalist, recording artist, music collector and re-seller. Hear (and buy) his music on Bandcamp, email him HERE, follow him on Instagram and check him out on Discogs.
