ISLANDS

No matter how poor Discovery was, this is the one where it gets really dreadful for me. The Wind of Chimes sounds like tasteless new-age ear candy that instantly makes my feet cringe. After the empty pathos of the Vangelis intro, it continues with a weak succession of poor folk and other fluffy clichés. It's performed on an early midi toy-keyboard and it even sounds amateurish as a result. And that from the man who used to be so adequate at the keyboards in the beginning of his career. And it gets worse when it is joined by the stale processed drum beats. No, there's not a hint of prog in sight during the entire tedious 22 minutes of it. Simply uninspired, clumsily written, uncommitted, heartless and poorly executed plastic elevator music.

Now, the pop on the second half is possibly worse. I won't comment on the individual tracks as I must admit I've never been able to sit through any of them for their entire short duration. This always goes skip skip skip skip stop before each track is one minute in.

Both in its pseudo-prog long track and AOR-style pop exercises; this is one of the worst albums I've ever heard. Skip.

Share this MIKE OLDFIELD review

Social review comments () BETA

---

---

Review related links

• Send comments to Bonnek
• Report this review (#279112)
• Buy MIKE OLDFIELD music online with PA partners
• Show all MIKE OLDFIELD MP3/Stream
• Go to MIKE OLDFIELD page for videos, full discography with ratings, reviews and much more
• Go to Islands page for more details, where to buy and ratings/reviews
• Search the Forum for MIKE OLDFIELD related discussions