Mike Oldfield was always more than "Tubular Bells." The 59-year-old multi-instrumentalist has continued to put out diverse, challenging music long after his signature tune was released nearly 40 years ago. In recent years, Universal Music Enterprises has done a great job of anthologizing Oldfield's work with expanded editions of his early works for Virgin Records; on August 14, not only will two new deluxe editions be released, but a brand-new career spanning compilation will hit stores as well.
UMe will next expand Platinum and QE2, Oldfield's last album of the 1970s and first of the 1980s, respectively. While Platinum saw Oldfield still pursuing progressive arrangements, as evidenced by the four-part suite on the first half of the record, he also started dabbling in reactions to popular sounds, including a cover of George and Ira Gershwin's standard "I Got Rhythm," the reactionary "Punkadiddle" and others. Oldfield would also have great success with non-LP singles, including disco track "Guilty" and the theme to the long-running British children's program Blue Peter. (In America, Platinum was remixed and resequenced as Airborn.) The expanded Platinum features "Blue Peter" and unreleased versions of parts of the Platinum suite, as well as a live show from London's Wembley Arena in 1980.
Follow-up album QE2 (named for the luxury ocean liner) furthers Oldfield's straddling between prog and pop, with covers of ABBA's "Arrival" and The Shadows' "Wonderful Land" in the mix. This expanded edition also features two non-LP tracks (including the single version of "Wonderful Land"), a new reworking of the album cut "Sheba" and another live disc from the ambitious Adventure Tour in Europe.
Finally, the double-disc Two Sides: The Very Best of Mike Oldfield offers a thorough and diverse overview of Oldfield's career, including hits for Virgin ("Tubular Bells," "Guilty," "Family Man," "Moonlight Shadow") and latter-day works released by Warner Bros. and Mercury.
You can order all three titles after the jump!
Platinum: Deluxe Edition (Mercury/UMe 5339422, 2012)
Disc 1: Expanded album
- Platinum Part One: Airborn
- Platinum Part Two: Platinum
- Platinum Part Three: Charleston
- Platinum Part Four: North Star/Platinum Finale
- Woodhenge
- Into Wonderland
- Punkadiddle
- I Got Rhythm
- Platinum (Live Studio Edition)
- North Star (2012 Remix)
- Blue Peter
Disc 2: Live at Wembley Arena, May 1980
- Platinum
- Punkadiddle
- I Got Rhythm
- Polka
- Incantations
- Tubular Bells Part II
- Guilty/Tubular Bells Part I Finale
- Blue Peter/Portsmouth
- William Tell
Disc 1, Tracks 1-8 released as Virgin LP V-2141 (U.K.), 1979
Disc 1, Tracks 9-10 and Disc 2 previously unreleased
Disc 1, Track 11 released as Virgin single A-side VS-317 (U.K.), 1979
QE2: Deluxe Edition (Mercury/UMe 5339418, 2012)
Disc 1: Expanded album
- Taurus 1
- Sheba
- Conflict
- Arrival
- Wonderful Land
- Mirage
- QE2
- Celt
- Molly
- Polka
- Wonderful Land (Single Version)
- Shiva (2012 Reworking of "Sheba")
Disc 2: Live in Essen, European Adventure Tour, April 1981
- Taurus 1
- Sheba
- Mirage
- Conflict
- Ommadawn
- Punkadiddle
- Tubular Bells Part I
- QE2
- Portsmouth
Disc 1, Tracks 1-9 released as Virgin LP V-2181 (U.K.)/Epic FE 37358 (U.S.), 1980
Disc 1, Track 10 was the B-side to "Arrival" - Virgin VS-374 (U.K.), 1980
Disc 1, Track 11 was a double A-side with "Sheba" - Virgin VS-387 (U.K.), 1980
Disc 1, Track 12 and Disc 2 previously unreleased
Two Sides: The Very Best of Mike Oldfield (Hip-O/UMe 5339182, 2012)
Disc 1
- Tubular Bells (Excerpt)
- Ommadawn (Excerpt)
- Crises
- The Lake
- Amarok (Excerpt 1)
- Amarok (Excerpt 2)
- Sentinel
- Supernova
- Ascension
- The Tempest
Disc 2
- Guilty (7" Version)
- Family Man
- Five Miles Out
- Moonlight Shadow
- Shadow on the Wall
- To France
- Etude
- Magic Touch
- Islands
- Heaven's Open
- Tattoo
- The Song of the Sun
- Summit Day
- Lake Constance
- Broad Sunlit Uplands
- The Doge's Palace
- Amber Light
- Angelique
- On My Heart
Disc 1, Track 1 from Tubular Bells (Virgin, 1973)
Disc 1, Track 2 from Ommadawn (Virgin, 1975)
Disc 1, Track 3 and Disc 2, Tracks 4-5 from Crises (Virgin, 1983)
Disc 1, Track 4 and Disc 2, Track 6 from Discovery (Virgin, 1984)
Disc 1, Tracks 5-6 from Amarok (Virgin, 1991)
Disc 1, Track 7 and Disc 2, Track 11 from Tubular Bells II (WEA, 1992)
Disc 1, Tracks 8-9 from The Songs of Distant Earth (Warner Bros., 1994)
Disc 1, Track 10 and Disc 2, Track 19 from Music of the Spheres (Mercury, 2008)
Disc 2, Track 1 was a non-LP single later released on Exposed (Virgin, 1979)
Disc 2, Tracks 2-3 from Five Miles Out (Virgin, 1982)
Disc 2, Track 7 from The Killing Fields: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack (Virgin, 1984)
Disc 2, Tracks 8-9 from Islands (Virgin, 1987)
Disc 2, Track 10 from Heaven's Open (Virgin, 1991)
Disc 2, Track 12 from Voyager (Warner Bros., 1996)
Disc 2, Track 13 from Guitars (Warner Bros., 1999)
Disc 2, Tracks 14-17 from The Millennium Bell (Warner Bros., 1999)
Disc 2, Track 18 from Light + Shade (Mercury, 2005)
William Keats says
And when will a complete Oldfield singles compilation be assembled? A number of his b-sides remain missing even after several "best-ofs" and career overviews that happily chop up what were side-long works into digestable chunks while ignoring uncollected b-sides like "Froggy Went a Courting".
Rob says
Very psyched for the live bonus discs, but disappointed that there's no 5.1 like the reissues of the first four albums. Also, initial vinyl pressings of Platinum had contained a track called "Sally". That version of the album was quickly withdrawn and "Sally" was replaced with "Into Wonderland." It would have been nice to have "Sally" on this reissue as it hasn't appeared on any Oldfield release since and is quite scarce.
Geoff Bailie - One Note Timeless says
Have you heard Froggy? It's abysmal but Don Alfonso is worse.
Geoff Bailie - One Note Timeless says
Oh and Sally is terrible too. Saved by a nice guitar solo mind you. "Sally I'm just a gorilla. I'll say I love you evermore. Even an ape from Manila couldn't stop me knocking on your door"?????????
Geoff Bailie - One Note Timeless says
These reissues are out in the UK. Live material is great. The live version of Polka is amazing.