THURSDAY AFTERNOON

Thursday Afternoon was originally commissioned by Sony to accompany a series of 7 video paintings Eno made for them in 1984. It's another of Eno's ambient works, featuring ghostly treated piano playing simple, repetitive motifs against a backdrop of gentle washes of electronic sound. The various componenents gradually shift into new permutations as the piece unfolds, but everything happens very slowly and extremely quietly - the final few minutes omit the piano altogether, leaving only the semi audible background noise to gently crystallise into new forms. It's a highly successful ambient work, but definitely non- essential as an addition to a prog collection. Ideal for listening to as you fall asleep.

Watching rain run down a window

Sitting in a chair near a window, quietly staring through the window during a heavy rain. Letting your focus blur to just the streaked grey in the sky. Listen to the sound on the roof as the beads well and roll down the glass. That is the image my mind conjures as I listen to Thursday Afternoon and I can't help but wonder if Eno appreciates when his fans mention a meditative effect, or if he bristles at that. Surely many will say these ambient albums are meant for active listening and I can appreciate them in that way, but my mind fades to peaceful blankness with this music if I allow it and the temptation is often to give in. Eno describes his style of composition here as "holographic" meaning that any small section of the piece is representative of the work as a whole. The album is 61 minutes of his quiet and contemplative playing pushing the envelope of what the sound painting can accomplish. Eno is a great artist but this album leaves me cold for the most part at least in comparison to his Apollo album or the Discreet album. For fans of Eno the album is one they will own eventually but I'd recommend that noobs start their exploration with earlier albums. Not bad but far from his creative peak.

Thursday Afternoon is a piece which fits right in with Brian Eno's declared aim for his ambient work, which is to create music which can exist as a pleasant backdrop or which can be listened to attentively just as viably. The approach taken is reasonably close to that of Music For Airports or Eno's collaboration with Howard Budd, focused as it is around synths and piano; the main departure this time around is Eno taking advantage of the extended running time of CDs for the first time in order to produce a single continuous 60 minute piece. Not groundbreaking, maybe, but notable as an ambient piece optimised for the constraints of CDs as Eno's previous albums were adapted to the constraints of vinyl.

Brian Eno has always been a man to put atmosphere first in all of his works, whether it be his art rock directions with Another Green World and Before And After Science, or his more well known ambient experiments of Music For Airports or Discreet Music. Like most highly innovative electronic musicians, Eno has a key sense of knowing fully well what his music is capable of in terms of space and flow. His subtlety is unwavering in terms of this music, and he manages to create not only some amazing pieces of art through it, but also one of my favorite albums ever recorded in music history, that being Thursday Afternoon.

Many people would probably ask me why I'd consider this album to be Brian Eno's best work, and it is both from a musical standpoint, but also from a technological and personal one as well.

This piece is all about subtlety. The whole sequence of events can be seen as a purely simple excursion, a simple looping of an acoustic piano mixed with an electronic backdrop of synths and nature recordings, but that is what it might seem at first. This hour long venture is all random, and what you may think as a repetitious cycle of calm noise is actually a very technical display of skills, with the chords on the piano changing so subtly with each passing moment, that once it finally hits you, you realize the full potential of Brian Eno's ambient workings. To me, this is the peak of Eno's ambient portfolio.

Whilst musically, it might be good on its own, the technological side of things allows it to shine. This is one of the first albums to take advantage of the then new CD format, and so Eno decided to create a 60 minute deliverance upon this beautiful venture. To some this might be excessive, but to me this showcases the almost beautiful array of technology Eno can master, modern or not. To me, this makes Eno one of the most modern musicians in recent memory, that, no matter the changing times, will always remain ahead of the game, and it is something I have always found endearing. This wouldn't be the last time Eno would take his hand at using new technology for his music as 30+ years later he'd release Reflection, not only as a CD and vinyl; not only a seasonal album that changes its run time, but also an app on IOS that went on for infinity. I'd say the 60 minutes add to the album's whole appeal for me, being this one hour, constantly changing piece that I always find new discoveries with.

However, this album has a distinct impact on me as a person. I do not like to get personal in my reviews as I am of the mindset to show music first rather than what it did for me in my personal life, but for this review I feel it is needed. I listened to this last year in January, and I consider 2022 to be one of the worst years of my life so far. I faced many challenges during that year, with friendship, emotions, stress, sexuality, and me as a whole. It was the year where I felt truly angry, bitter, and above all else, sad in my life. It was a roller coaster that I wished never happened. But, whenever I felt a cold wavering of emotions through me, I would listen to this album at the middle of the night, fully. It started with January as I was under a ton of pressure within my school work, and it not only calmed me, but also gave me a sense of hope, a sense that everything will be alright in the end, and soon whenever I felt stressed, or under pressure, I would always try and calm myself with this piece of music. Sometimes it didn't work, I admit, not every impactful album in my life can be played every single moment, but, whenever I am in the mood, I will always play this record to give me serenity. This is an album that means so much in the long run, and it helped me get through the past year, and hopefully many more to come.

This hour long masterpiece Eno has made is in a special place in my heart. It is the album that, again, helped me get through the past year, and I think it deserves much recognition. While it may seem simple, this piece has layers to me, and it is an album that I do not think I can live without. Truly, truly amazing.