In my imagination the executives at Virgin Records are sitting at the pub after work one day and one evil executive says to the others “I am the greatest record executive of all time!”
The others snicker – they know the exec has had his pint or two but think they’ll tease him just a bit.
“Oh yeah?” one pipes up, “well I bet you can’t sell even ten more copies of that old Tubular Bells Part 1 song from 1973.” The room explodes with laughter, but the Bad Guy isn’t laughing – in fact he’s got that serious look of a drunk who doesn’t get the joke…
“Kid, let me tell you something,” he says, serious as a triage nurse, “I can sell more copies of that song than has been sold in the history of horror movie theme songs.” The room goes silent. “and I’ll do it without putting it in a record store for the first six months from release date.”
As you can imagine, the crowd is overwhelmed with disbelief – then the giggles start. The giggles turn to laughs and the laughs to guffaws. Beer is squirting out noses, people are peeing in the aisles.
The Record Executive rises up and his voice thunders across the pub “I WILL PROVE MY GREATNESS TO YOU. YOU SHALL BOW BEFORE ME!!!! I AM THE RECORD EXECUTIVE THAT OTHER RECORD EXECUTIVES SHOULD HONOR WITH THE BLOOD OF THEIR SONS!!!” and vanished in a burst of fire.
Virgin Records released Pure Moods in 1997. The album made history as the only compilation to ever make it into the Billboard Top 10 chart. It includes the song Tubular Bells Part 1 by Mike Oldfield, which was the theme for the movie The Exorcist. The above imaginary tale is the only scenario I can think of that would explain the recycling of Virgin’s purely moody acts into this 73 minute slice of pure evil.
Here is the track listing:
Enigma - Return To Innocence
Enya - Orinoco Flow (Sail Away)
Deep Forest - Sweet Lullaby
Jean Michele Jarre - Oxygene Part IV
DJ Dado - X Files Theme
Mike Oldfield – Tubular Bells Part 1
Enigma – Sadeness
Adiemus – Adiemus
Jan Hammer - Crockett's Theme
Ennio Morricone - Theme From "The Mission"
David Byrne - Main Title Theme (The Last Emperor)
Sacred Spirits - Yeha – Noha
Angelo Badalamenti - Theme from Twin Peaks
Geoffrey Oryema – Makambo
Mark Isham - My Wife With Champagne Shoulders
Michael Nyman - The Promise
David A. Stewart - Lily Was Here
There is a rule in the entertainment industry: If it sells make more just like it.
Check it out:
Pure Moods II – November, 1998
Loreena McKennitt - The Mummers' Dance
Cusco – Montezuma
Sacred Spirit - The Cradlesong
Yanni – Nightengale
Dream Academy – Life In A Northern Town
Craig Armstrong Weatherstorm III – Zarabanda
Delerium – Euphoria
Craig Armstrong – Weatherstorm
Massive Attack – Teardrop
Clannad - Theme From Harry's Game
Vangelis - Chariots Of Fire
George Benson – Breezin – ed. Note: wtf?
Dave Koz – Emily
Ottomar Liebert - 2 The Night
Enigma - Beyond The Invisible
Loreena McKennitt - The Mystic Dream
And if you thought you were safe you were wrong. Behold:
Pure Moods III - February 2001
Enya- Only If
Moby – Porcelain
Mono - Life in Mono
Peter Gabriel - Games Without Frontiers
David Lanz- Christophori's Dream
Geoffrey Oryema - Land of Anaka
Sacred Spirit - Dela Dela
Ryuichi Sakamoto – Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence
Suzanne Ciani - Velocity of Love
Sheila Chandra - Ever So Lonely
Jessie Cook – Virtue
Kitaro- Theme From Silk Road
Blue Man Group – Synaesthetic
Yanni - On Sacred Ground
Enigma - Gravity of Love
Sarah Brightman - Deliver Me
How to stop this madness? It is not for me or you to say. We are but noders, documenting the humanity that breathes around us. Or whatever.