CRISES

You get the complete Mike Oldfield package here with a certain Mr. Jon Anderson dropping in to lay down a vocal track which he wrote the lyrics for as well. Oldfield is in top musical and compositional form with 5 vocal tracks a short but sweet instrumental and the 21 minute showpiece title track where we also get to hear him do vocals.

Oldfield was uncompromising with talent selection and engineering on this flawless masterwork. Most notable guest player on the album is drummer Simon Philips who had up to that time played with everyone from Pete Townshend to Jeff Beck. His contributions to this project are most apparent on the main piece Crises where he and Mike partake in an excellent drum bash.The piece is synths and drums all the way with the synths stating the main theme and the drums offer accents throughout. Not one minute is wasted and we are treated early on to Tubular Bells era soft tone guitar sounds on this eloquently layered piece with absolutely no grey areas.

The series of vocal tracks which constitute the first section of the album (side 1 on vinyl) are shared by Maggie Reilly, a previous Oldfield collaborator, power vocalist Roger Chapman ( ex Family ) and our friend Mr. Anderson. Sort of reminds one of the time he popped in on an early King Crimson record. Master of ceromonies Oldfield assigns their tasks with undoubtable skill. Maggie Reilly gets the softer tracks with some heavy themes which explore intrigue, desperation and indescision. Shadow On The Wall, the heaviest song is belted out quite capably by Roger Chapman previously with Family in the early seventies. In High Places is Mr. Anderson's responsibility who aquits himself equally well out of his Yes element. The icing on the cake on this one is the instrumental track with Mike doing the spanish guitar thing with an Oldfield twist on Taurus III.

All in all a very rythhmical and layered work with Mike Oldfield at the top of his game surpassing everything since Tubular Bells. Listen to this album with high expectations.