That's interesting, because I personally feel like it's a much tighter disparity than you're giving Reed credit for. Not only does he have the tones and textures down pat, but the compositions themselves are just as full of character and detail and interesting themes as Oldfield's best IMO. The Reed albums are copycats, no doubt, but I don't detect anything inherently inferior about them when compared in a vaccuum. They simply lack the weight of history and the kudos that comes with being the progenitor of the particular style in which they are written and recorded.

It would be fascinating to conduct an experiment with, say, 100 people who are intimately familar with Oldfield's classic albums but haven't heard either Return to Ommadawn or Sancturary. You could play them both albums and ask them to decide which was by Oldfield and which was by another musician. I could be wrong, but I feel like the results would be a pretty even split.

Ultimately, I get why Rob's solo albums can be offputting and not everyone's cup of tea, but Return to Ommadawn is looking increasingly likely to be Oldfield's last forary into Tubular Bells style composition, so I'd much rather have the ocassional convincing forgery courtesy of Rob Reed to enjoy than no new music at all in that vein.