Description
2020, 2×12″ compilation LP, Opal Records/BMG.
Brian Eno is celebrated for lots of reasons – his pioneering ambient work, his role as a producer-for-hire on some landmark records by other people – but previously his role as a soundtrack composer is not one of them. This is slightly odd, because Eno has provided music for countless films and television shows over the last four-and-a-bit decades, as this excellent retrospective of soundtrack highlights proves. Kicking off with his creepy, chiming theme from Channel 4’s Top Boy, the album moves between experimental soundscapes (‘Blood Red, from a BBC documentary on Francis Bacon), swelling and quietly symphonic synthesizer sounds (‘Decline and Fall’, an intergalactic-sounding piece from the Dune soundtrack), languid Americana (‘Beach Sequence’, from his Passengers project), and the kind of lucid ambient compositions Eno probably knocks out in his sleep. – Juno
