Tubular Bells

Tubular Bells. Made by a 19-year-old. Actually, almost entirely made by a 19-year-old. Let that sink in for a bit.

I always had a hard time writing a review for this album. In a way, if there should be one album that should be synonymous with progressive rock, it's probably Tubular Bells. It's a suite made of a myriad of different little ideas that jump between each other to create a cohesive unit of self-indulgent properties (another characteristic of prog).

A tale of two sides. Side A is the overindulgent one with the elitist rock approach, manhandling all the instruments and switching scenes like they're nothing, and it's here where the tone is set. Either you'll love it or hate it, nothing in between.

Side B starts off with a mellower, slower approach with almost ambient quality, that shift towards a more schizophrenic groove with an avant sensibility but quickly makes it back to familiar turf once again.

Tubular Bells is an experience I like to relive every once in a while, and while it has maybe aged a bit badly in the discourse regarding progressive rock's place in the musical sphere, I find it enjoyable and a great starting point in an epoch of music where excess was the norm, it was just a matter of finding the right amount.

Obviously a Classic and a fitting album to have the day before Halloween. The Piano intro is brilliant and the entire piece is a wonderful piece of music, before Prog Rock got too quirky and kitsch. I really dug the second part of the album this time around as well. Tubular Bells part II doesn't really get the attention that the first side gets, but it's a nice piece on its own. Always a good album really, there's other long Prog songs of course but none quite like this.

I’ve been getting back into death note lately, so when I heard the first song I was pleasantly reminded of L’s theme. Anyway this is a good album. There’s an interesting semblance of a polymeter in the building moments of the first track, and it’s really interesting and mesmerizing. The proggy instrumental and surreal album cover both help to invoke some strange sense of nature filtered through the weirdness of life. It kind of makes every single passing moment feel like it ties into the album, the color of the sky, the sun on your skin, the wind as it pushes against your body.

The other cool thing about this album is a 19 year old made it. Yep, dude couldn’t even drink and was making shit like this. He probably did drink though. This shit’s way too cool for him to have done it completely sober. Probably. I dunno. Anyway the instrumentation is great, and the lack of conventional structure makes the album feel a lot shorter, yet a lot bigger, than it actually is.

The album’s biggest weakness is its lack of consistency on the first track. It switches from idea to idea much too quickly for my taste, whereas on the second track it fleshes out the ideas much, much more. Either way though, this album is really great, and I recommend it.
7.5/10
DOES IT BELONG ON THE LIST: sure
REASON: sets an example for other young and aspiring musicians

This may be a hot take, but it's like a better Mannheim Steamroller.

This gets boring far before it gets finished.

Part 1 - 89
Part 2 - 87

Tubular Bells - 88

Pleasant.

Jedan od rijetkih artsy fartsy čudnih albuma koje cijenim ne samo na muzičkom nivou. Ovo je jedna od prekretnica muzike od dosadnih popastih stvari prema eksperimentaciji. Jedva punoljetan frajer svira milion instrumenata i uspijeva napraviti mega hit od albuma. A nekim čudom i ne zvuči toliko loše. Svaki put se iznenadim koliko stvarno nije dosadno. New age na vrhuncu otprilike što se mene tiče. I legendarno je bilo kad je Del Boy kupio ovu ploču Raquel umjesto "Bruce Oldfielda". Morala sam i ja sebi nabaviti to i Rio zbog Mućki čim sam krenula skupljati ploče.

It's a pretty sick (mostly) instrumental album. It goes hard, opening with the theme from The Excorcist, then part two concludes with the shanty used for Popeye the Sailor Man's theme.

An entire album consisting of one long song. It better be good, then. Thankfully, it is pretty good. It's not my favorite listen of the list, or even of the era, but it does flow very naturally and stay decently engaging throughout. It is completely instrumental and features a section where Oldfield just throws random instruments on the record for the sake of doing so, therefore seeming more like a passion piece for its creator rather than a full-fledged album intended for listeners. It's not for everyone, but it's not the worst thing I've ever listened to.

This album is ranked #20 of 30 albums for 1973. Other 1973 albums rated by me:
The Dark Side of the Moon(1/30)-5
Goodbye Yellow Brick Road(2/30)-4
Let's Get It On(4/30)-5
(Pronounced 'Leh-'Nerd 'Skin-'Nerd)(5/30)-5
Band On The Run(6/30)-5
Catch a Fire(8/30)-4
Head Hunters(10/30)-4
Tres Hombres(11/30)-4
Raw Power(12/30)-4
Countdown to Ecstasy(13/30)-3
Selling England by the Pound(15/30)-4
Paris 1919(25/30)-3

This was chill. I like the part where they just start naming instruments. The album I saw on apple music was just different versions of the same thing, so for that it gets 3*
Highlights: p1 (because movie)

What a magical album.

If we scored in decimals this is a 4.9 star, it’s so close to being a 5 for me but just didn’t quite get me to that point.

It is a great album though. There have been instrumental albums where my mind has started to wander at times but even when there was sections I wasn’t particularly feeling, I was pulled back into it pretty quickly.

As I was reading the reviews, I noticed that people were talking about this album in a negative manner, mentioning that Mike used virtually every instrument ever created while recording this album. However, I would like to note something that nobody else has seemed to mention. The first 14 minutes of the 1st track contains dabbling on a keyboard with very high-pitched notes. Why is this important, you may ask? Well, the answer has to do with the United States government. It’s a known fact that the government uses birds to spy on everyday civilians, including you and me. But it’s common to note that birds are extremely sensitive to high frequencies. Given that, I had the brilliant idea to loop the first 14 minutes of Tubular Bells pt. 1 and play it outside near all the bird nests. Since then, I haven’t seen a bird in ages! And I would highly recommend that you do the same. And the best part, you can even enjoy the music! Together, we can make a change. Place a tape containing the first 14 minutes of this album near all the bird nests and watch as the government surveillance props fly away! That’ll make the IRS mad!

There was nothing to dislike here! The only struggle I'll have is whether to round this up to four stars or round it down to three

⭐⭐⭐.51

4/5. Tubular bells is most famous for its first few minutes which became the theme for the 1973 film “The Exorcist.” However that is only a small portion of this nearly 50 minute long instrumental prog epic (though it is split into two halves.) It’s definitely not something you’d put on for some casual listening, but it’s one of those records that really feels like a journey, it goes places. One of my favorite moments is around the 10:00-13:00 minute mark in the first half where the song gets much quieter with a tiny guitar line that slowly develops until another line harmonizes with it. And there’s a ton of moments like that throughout. Great listen.

3.0

Holy shit is this album bad. The first 30 seconds are kinda great -- you know, the bit they loop on The Exorcist. The rest is completely pointless and aimless guitar noodling. It absolutely sounds like a 19 year old made this because it's basically the 1970s version of a guy who plays coffee shops with a loop station, piling a bunch of diatonic crap on top of each other. I legitimately think he could have looped The Exorcist bit for 40 minutes and had a post-minimalist masterpiece. But alas, we have to live with this garbage forever. And somehow Richard Branson became a zillionaire from this?

3.5 🧟

I was wondering how long it would take to get this one. 648 is the answer I guess. This is one of the albums that I have seen a million times and know that it's hotly debated but I don't think I've ever actually heard any of it. I'm excited to finally check this one of the list today, let's dive in...
Ok so I had at least heard some of this before, it's in The Exorcist. I had no idea that's what this was. Maybe I'm dumb. Who writes a song in 15/8 time? Or maybe alternating 7/8 and 8/8. But there's a 9/8 thrown in too I think? Wild.
I really liked this album but can get why it's so divisive. It definitely deserves a spot on this list. It's super ambitious and quite an achievement to have pulled off. I would absolutely buy this if I came across it in the record shop and though I might not play it all the time, it would be a good one to pull out when I felt like it. 4/5