Off Topic: Mike Oldfield’s Ommadawn, part of his early classic trilogy of albums, along with Tubular Bells and Hergest Ridge, has been given the super-deluxe reissue treatment.

Here’s the official description:

Digitally remastered deluxe two disc (CD + NTSC/Region 0 DVD) edition of the British guitarist’s 1975 album including a bonus original demo of the perennial Christmas favorite, ‘In Dulce Jubilo’ plus a DVD that features 5.1 surround sound mixes by Oldfield and the original promo videos for ‘In Dulci Jubilo’ and ‘Portsmouth’.

Ommadawn remains one of Oldfield’s favorite works. Recorded at his then home at Hergest Ridge, it again took the form of two lengthy suites of music, but here there are added Irish and African influences.

Oldfield looked towards composition on traditional instruments; It is affecting music that acted as a precursor to the New Age musical movement. Featuring folk legends Clodagh Simons and Paddy Moloney as well as African drummers, Jabula, Ommadawn is a work of great beauty, and like Hergest Ridge before it, established the fact that there was much more to Mike Oldfield than Tubular Bells.

Oldfield is best known for Tubular Bells. But Hergest Ridge and Ommadawn demonstrated that Oldfield’s tremendous success was no fluke, and were at least the equals of Tubular Bells.