Saturday Songs – August 25, 2012

For a lot of people, they know Mike Oldfield either from his performance during the opening ceremonies for the London 2012 Olympics or from Tubular Bells, which was used as the theme to The Exorcist, not even realizing the vast scope of his music.  This is mostly because not too many people stray into the New Age section of their record stores where he is often categorized.

My first exposure to Mike Oldfield came when I was back in high school with the song Magic Touch.

The song itself was just the right mix of pop sound and trippy visuals (I saw the video first) to pull me into his music.  I bought the cassette, Islands, and loved not only the songs that followed the more traditional style of music, but the longer form Wind Chimes Part 1 & 2 as well.  Soon I was searching the bins for his CDs, finding a lot of what he composed inspirational, creatively, that is.  When I created sound tracks for some of my earliest writings, I used his songs to help set the mood, and still do.

Mike Oldfield’s music is available on iTunes and Amazon.com.