Tonight we're gonna party like it's 1995 (an Interlude)

I've been reading "A Year with swollen appendices, Brian Eno's diary." He kept this diary during 1995, at which time he was working (to varying degrees) on David Bowie~Outside, James~Whiplash, Passengers~Original Soundtrack & Eno/Wobble~Spinner, all of which I've owned since they came out. I decided to take a day to listen to these four discs.

Outside Wow. This album truly keeps getting better and better. In the midst of the peaceful idyll of the mid-nineties, Bowie taps into an Orwellian paranoia that doesn't seem that far fetched today. The band is spectacular, and Eno's influence is abundant.

Whiplash Of these four albums, this is the one that Brian was the least involved with. It's chock full of great songs, and the band is tight, but in the context of an Eno review it hardly qualifies.

Original Soundtrack Essentially U2+Eno, this disc is going into heavy rotation for me. In terms of the diary, there is a rather detailed section when they are working on this album. As such it is excellent to be able to read about the in studio process, and then hear the end results.

Spinner This album has been, and continues to be an influence as a way of working. Essentially Eno handed a bunch of tapes over to Jah Wobble, who then added his own work. Oddly enough, even though all four of these albums remind me at least somewhat of specific times in my life, this disc gave me the strongest flashbacks as it were.

So in conclusion, most of my non-listening-project listening has been Eno-based. I am, after all, the fourth deadly Finn.