Contents

The Songs of Distant Earth (album): Difference between revisions

Revision as of 15:53, 15 June 2006

It was the first album released as an Enhanced CD. Two different versions of the Enhanced CD content exist, however. The second pressing, released in 1995, contains more of the multimedia content including the full version of the "Let There be Light" video. The audio content is unchanged.

The Songs of Distant Earth was the first of Oldfield's foray into science fiction-related music, and songs such as "Supernova" and "Hibernaculum" could be seen as similar or even influenced by Enigma, while "New Beginning" has ethnic world chants in the style of Deep Forest.

Track listing

1. "In the Beginning" – 1:24
2. "Let There be Light" – 4:57
3. "Supernova" – 3:23
4. "Magellan" – 4:40
5. "First Landing" – 1:16
6. "Oceania" – 3:19
7. "Only Time Will Tell" – 4:26
8. "Prayer for the Earth" – 2:09
9. "Lament for Atlantis" – 2:43
10. "The Chamber" – 1:48
11. "Hibernaculum" – 3:32
12. "Tubular World" – 3:22
13. "The Shining Ones" – 2:59
14. "Crystal Clear" – 5:42
15. "The Sunken Forest" – 2:37
16. "Ascension" – 5:49
17. "New Beginning" – 1:37

Trivia

• The spoken section at the beginning of the album is Apollo 8 astronaut Bill Anders reading from the Book of Genesis while orbiting the MoononChristmas Day, 1968.

• The Gregorian Chant on "Hibernaculum" is not Latin, but the chant on "Let There be Light" is.

• The Saami chant on "Prayer For The Earth" was composed and performed by Nils Aslak Valkeapää. The chant is from the movie Ofelas ("Pathfinder").

Clarke and Oldfield

In the booklet of one of releases of the album, there is a foreword by Arthur C. Clarke about the evolution of Songs of Distant Earth from short story to novel. It ends with the following about the album:

"Since the finale of the novel is a musical concert, I was delighted when Mike Oldfield told me that he wished to compose a suite inspired by it. I was particularly impressed by the music he wrote for The Killing Fields and now, having played the CD of The Songs of Distant Earth, I feel he has lived up to my expectations.

Welcome back into space, Mike: there's still lots of room out here."