while on his first three albums ("ommadawn","hergest ridge","Tubular bells") Mike was practising his folk-rock-progressive style, here he creates a real Rock symphony.
77 minutes ("ommadawn" was lasting 36 minutes...) of a huge and bombastic rock-opera based on a poems of Ben Johnson and Longfellow (english 18 century poets) and his own experiences (in the time Mike had gone though Exegis therapy because of his psychical problems).
Whole album sounds much different than anything he had made through the next years of his career.Guitar that was so charactereistic in his earlier records is hidden here on second plan.Massive choir,orchestral arrangments,synths and opera sounds are dominating in "part 1" and "part 2".they all give album a bit Film music or classical music taste.
During last 8 minutes of "part 2" Maddie Pryor (from Steelaye span band) is singing the "Hawaiatha" poem with the background of Jabula african drums band and etheric vibraphone part (Pierre morlen from Gong,he will collaborate with Mike in the later years too).This part is hypnotising listeners because of monotoic Vocal intonations and very spiritual atmosphere...
but i save all the honours for "part 3" and "part 4" which are in my opinion one of Mike's finest instrumental works in in his whole Career.
"Part 3" starts with a cheerfull Fanfare medieval motive...but suddenly starts the maginficent long Guitar solo section...African tribal Drums are again on background along with gentle Bass riff and synths...the raw and moving Gitar solo is one of hte moments that can brought tears into your eyes because of a imposible beauty that lies underneath it.later staright to the end "part 3" goes into the nice seventies rocker with nice drums and guitars...
"part 4" is much more experimental - etheric and mysterious Vibraphone part dominates here...i have to mention also the another tribal drums section with a rhythmical Bass guitar riff and charming Guitar solo...the ending is a All time Oldfield Classic - Maddie Pryor singing "ode to diana" along with a bit christmas-like melody.guitar solo is wonderfull.....
This is definitly a magical album...takes you to a different world of ancient tribes and distant planets...it is one of the most impressive and timeless instrumental albums ever...77 minutes of pure pleasure.definitive must have for all rock fans!

It's difficult to describe this album; it's not quite like his earlier works (Tubular Bells, Hergest Ridge, Ommadawn) but yet notquite like those that came later (such as Platinum and QE2). Although I have to say it's not one of my *most* favourite MO albums, I still find myself compelled to listen to it from time to time, especially the final track (Incantations 4). For anyone who is a serious fan of Mike Oldfield, I have to recommend this. For those who are just beginning their voyage along the Oldfield path, then I'd recommend that you listen (or buy!) Ommadawn and/or Hergest Ridge first....then the orchestration on this album will make more sense. Five out of five nevertheless!

When this album came out, it was a double LP. It probably should have been condensed into one album. This release has some of the best sections of Oldfield music in existence, mostly contained in Parts 1 and 3. Many other parts of the album are, however, very repetitive and grate. The Song of Hiawatha poem in part 2 is quite nice but, once again, goes on too long. This CD is certainly worth picking up, if nothing else for the first and third parts. Even these are repetitive in places, however. This is nothing like the tightly constructed Platinum that followed it.

This may very well be my favorite Oldfield piece as well as one of my favorite minimalist works. I believe this album was Oldfield's first after Ommadawn and that it came nearly three years later. Those three years were well spent, beleive me! As good as Ommadawn is, I actually prefer Incantations for several reasons. The first and obvious reason is that it's longer than Ommadawn. I'd rather have 70 minutes of Mike's music that 40 minutes any day! Another reason is that Incantations sounds slightly less dated (and has a more enduring appeal for me) than Ommadawn. Ommadawn is a little too psychedelic at times for my preference and I sometimes get the feeling that he set out to accomplish slightly more with it than he actually did. I never get that feeling with Incantations. Also, Ommadawn lacks the sheer musical drama of Incantations. The first and fourth parts are particularly dramatic.

If you like Mike's long pieces (most of Mike's fans do!) and if you find minimalist works at all palatable, you will love Incantations. I noticed that some of the reviewers have pointed out that more than a minute is missing from the original release but, never having heard the original, I don't miss a thing. I would certainly have preferred to have purchased the work in its entirety, but it's so good even as it is that I really can't complain. This is a five star effort any way you slice it!

By the way, if you like minimalist compositions, check out Steve Reich's "The Four Sections."

This was the only Oldfield album I never listened to much on vinyl as I always preferred the wonderful live version on 'Exposed', so seeing it available newly remastered it seemed like a good time to become re-acquianted. I still it find less inspiring than the live version - particularly parts three and four - with too many weedy sounding keyboards and sparser instrumentation, especially during moments when the huge band on the live version would generate an awesome crescendo of sound. Having said that, it is still a very good, and often mesmerising, piece of music and happily the sound quality of the HDCD remasters is excellent and a huge improvement on previous CD's.

This is more than can be said for the shoddy packaging, though, which applies for all the remasters I have purchased. The covers are very poor quality - almost like colour photo-copies giving the appearance of a pirate bootleg - and the booklets are cheap and flimsy. The booklets come with specially written liner notes which are excrutiatingly banal and full of errors. For example, the notes repeatedly make reference to the inclusion of the track 'Guilty' which does not even appear on the album, and never has. On the album 'QE2' the writer claims that the title track takes up the whole of side one (it appears on side two and at only seven minutes long could never have taken up the whole side of any album).

If an infinite number of monkeys with an infinite number of typewriters could write the works of Shakespear then I reckon it would take half a dozen monkeys with a packet of crayons to write better sleeve notes than this. Surprisingly, the guy responsible was brave enough to put his name to this drivel.

Elsewhere, the tracklisting for the album 'Crises' completely omits one of the tracks and the small print for 'The Killing Fields' indicates that I am actually listening to 'Five Miles Out'. These examples (I'm sure there are many more) are not just small, petty errors, but whopping great errors than even a cursory proof reading could have avoided. The one redeeming feature is that if you collect all the new remasters a tubular bells image will appear on the spines, providing, of course, that you put them in the right order.

Kudos for the those responsible for the remastering then, but shame on Virgin for the awful packaging.