Taking Tiger Mountain By Strategy

Eno again succeeds in using the recording studio as an instrument in making an amazing record. The young genius employs his friend and mentor Peter Schmidt to create a record cover, and the Portsmouth Sinfonia to supply a touch of the avant garde...going, going, gone!

Very little apparently. To quotes wiki "Brian Eno, who found a book of postcards from the opera in San Francisco, later used the title on his second solo album, Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy).” I love Eno’s work but wish there was more to the title but a cool postcard and a catchy phrase. Not about the work per se.

Of Eno’s four song oriented albums of the ‘70s this is the most consistent and least experimental. A collection of quirky, oddly poppy songs that range from the joyously chirpy break in “Mother Whale Eyeless” to the clockwork menace of “The Great Pretender”. The lyrics are clever and funny and the music is dominated by conventional instrumentation. Eno is a great songwriter and I wish he had kept it up. This is as conventional a rock record as Eno would ever make, and it is essential.

Fine under punk

This music is odd but odder still is how you will not forget it and long to hear it again.

If you can't reverse a bad day, listen to this and the other masterful sweet and sour treasures from Brian Eno in his earlier days (although I adore his ambient pieces as well!) You will gain enough perspective to realize that there are enough things to appreciate in this insane world we live in so that you may mitigate, if not forget, your troubles. I have been listening to this album from from virtually the day it hit the record stores and every listen is bound to bring a grin at one point and reverant joy at another. The best amateur musician that has lived on Earth.

Fun, fun, fun - and funny. So joyful - can you tell, I love this album.