Amarok (Mike Oldfield album)
| Amarok | ||||
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| Studio album by Mike Oldfield | ||||
| Released | 28 May 1990 | |||
| Recorded | September 1989 – March 1990 | |||
| Genre | World, progressive rock | |||
| Length | 60:02 | |||
| Label | Virgin | |||
| Producer |
Tom Newman Mike Oldfield |
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| Mike Oldfield chronology | ||||
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| Allmusic |    |
Amarok is Mike Oldfield's 13th album, and was released in 1990. Oldfield originally conceived it as an "angry, protest album", showcasing his musical technique. It is presented as a single sixty-minute track of continuous, uninterrupted but constantly changing music.
Oldfield's relationship with Virgin Records had become increasingly fraught. As a result of ongoing arguments about his contract terms, royalties and advances he decided to create an album designed to both please his fans, and annoy executives at Virgin. Virgin had been trying to convince Oldfield to release a sequel to Tubular Bells, possibly because of the cachet associated with the name, particularly as Oldfield's contract was nearing its end, with three albums left to deliver to the company.
Amarok was designed as a single piece, which made it more difficult for Virgin to produce a section for radio-friendly airplay or single release. Given its length of approximately one hour, it was also extremely unlikely the album could ever be played on popular radio. Oldfield has never performed the piece live in its entirety, though he has played excerpts; excerpts have also appeared on artist "best-of" collections and samplers.
Oldfield had expressed his displeasure at Virgin's lack of promotion of his works on a number of occasions, and Amarok can easily be seen as his riposte to their perceived indifference: an almost unmarketable album that still showcased his talent as a composer and performer. Oldfield did attempt to generate publicity for the album himself by offering a prize of £1000 of his own money to the first person to find the "secret message" hidden within it, although the competition received relatively little coverage and its impact on sales was seemingly negligible. The secret message was a sequence of Morse code found 48 minutes into the piece, spelling out "FUCK OFF RB" in reference to Virgin's Richard Branson, the man who had first signed him.
Amarok, along with Heaven's Open (Oldfield's final album for Virgin) can be seen as an emphatic and dismissive farewell to the record company. In a parody of the spoof listening instructions on the sleeve of Tubular Bells, the album's back cover reads: " HEALTH WARNING – This record could be hazardous to the health of cloth-eared nincompoops. If you suffer from this condition, consult your Doctor immediately ". In the end, Oldfield did not release his sequel to Tubular Bells until he joined Warner.
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Wikipedia