Mike Oldfield- Moonlight Shadow REACTION AND REVIEW

[@maraboo72]

There is another wonderful Shadow song by Oldfield: "Shadow on the Wall" sung by Roger Chapman, the King of the Shouters.

[@greghansell5115]

Like the guitar solo and how the songs builds up to a crescendo of sound.

[@urmeli0815]

I remember hearing this song all the time during our vacation in Italy in the summer of 1983. Good times!

[@RyanCMcD]

Classic song that gets melodically heavier as it goes along with a great guitar solo section. Maggie's voice is so sweet you might not immediately pick up on the dark subject lol.

[@billjones8503]

True!

[@steffNewtown]

Wonderful Annie Haslam from Renaissance did a version of it too😍 available on KZbin.

[@Mink-yu8nu]

Dave Angel Eco warrior.

[@kozlorf]

1983 was a year of Moonlight Shadow and Owner of a Lonely Heart And Mama ;)

[@viceroyzh]

Those days are gone. At least, the music is still here.

[@mightyV444]

Also 'Sharp-Dressed Man' by ZZ Top, 'This Is Not A Love Song' by P.I.L. and U2's 'War' album 😊

[@Silber7]

So prog artists going on pop radio shouldn't have been a surprise for listeners

[@TimvanderLeeuw]

And Nena's 99 Luftballons (99 Red Balloons).

[@sarahzentexas]

Ohhh I have been waiting for this one 🙌 Fun story: I was in a liquor store in Denver in November of 1983, and this song came on the store’s sound system. I heard it and wouldn’t leave until it was over. Got the “moonlight shadow” part, went home, called the cool radio station (KBCO Boulder, for those who know) and asked for help identifying the artist. They told me Mike Oldfield. I remembered Tubular Bells, and thought they were wrong, but no, they insisted they were reading it directly as it was on their playlist. I was surprised, but ever since, I’ve had this song/the extended version on a playlist since playlists were invented. I also got it from Napster back in the day, burned it onto every mix CD I made, etc. it’s my SECOND favorite song, maybe 😉

[@Tredecimus]

6:01 that’s me. Loved the song when it came out, was amazed by the artwork of the cover, listened to the album - and went down that rabbit hole. A lot. Played all of his albums over and over again the upcoming years.

[@mightyV444]

Mike Oldfield had actually told his band on recording day that this was meant to sound like a Hit Single! 😉 The background story to this song is quite interesting also otherwise and can be read about on Phil Spalding's website, who plays the bass here (and also in parts of the title track) and who had been Oldfield's touring bassist for a number of years. I'd been in loose contact with him via social media for a few years and before his sudden passing in May last year, which were sad news to me indeed. Prior to Oldfield, he'd been in several other bands, including Toyah, and in later years he was working as a session bassist for people like Mick Jagger, Elton John, Robbie Williams and Terence Trent D'Arby.

[@thesoundlikechameleons2082]

February.

[@mightyV444]

​@@thesoundlikechameleons2082 - Thank you! 😉👍

[@Grib68-]

I can no longer hear this song without picturing Dave Angel eco warrior walking away and then turning and pointing at the camera lol

[@neilhinks5734]

Brilliant song, brilliant single...what a voice Justin...I've always loved this gorgeous song..❤❤❤ I've always thought Crises is one of his greatest achievements to this day my friend,loved your face listening to this...🫶🫶🫶

[@johnnelson3665]

You always do a great job with these reviews. Such a cool and relaxing song.

[@johng5859]

My introduction to Mike Oldfield came when I was very young, on a wonderful double compilation album released in 1985 called The Complete Mike Oldfield which my Dad owned - it had a kingfisher on the cover. It was an excellent showcase for the breadth and range of his music, with side 1 devoted to short instrumental pieces, side 2 featuring songs with vocals (Moonlight Shadow was the opening track), side 3 excerpts from his longer pieces and side 4 live performances. I was immediately fascinated by how one man could produce so many different kinds of music, and I have been a fan ever since.

[@jimschroeder1176]

I own this CD.

[@thesoundlikechameleons2082]

I have the 7" vinyl sleeve of Moonlight Shadow signed by: Phil Spalding (bassist) R.I.P. Simon Phillips (drummer) Maggie Reilly (vox) I chatted with Phil before he passed away last year. A very nice bloke who told me a few things about working in the music business and fame! He even sent me a Christmas 🎄 card! A timeless number from 1983. ~ C 13 . 09 . 2024

[@sarahzentexas]

Is that the extended version with the extra guitar and lyrics? I love it so much ❤

[@thesoundlikechameleons2082]

​@sarahzentexas - Hi, no it is the 7" mix 3:37 normal version with Rite of man on the b - side. Yes it is a beautiful yet tragic song.

[@mattleppard1964]

I’ve not heard this for years. Lovely ❤

[@sheldonhowells3083]

I remember when this song was first released, hearing it on the radio a few times, thoroughly enjoying it, but not realising, for a while, it was a Mike Oldfield track! This a great little pop song with a fantastic guitar solo by Mike! I have always had a problem, though, with the line "Four A.M. in the morning"; if it's Four A.M., then it's understood that it's the morning!

[@dancub1]

Always bugged me too..... I know I'm being pedantic but I can't help it😀It's just wrong!

[@sphericalharmony1603]

Simon and Garfunkel did the same thing! 😄😄

[@mightyV444]

Good point, Sheldon! 😅 It's still better than a certain Dance Pop remake I'd once heard (Can't remember the artist, though) in which they actually sing 🎵"Fooour aaam in the mooorning"🎵! 🙈 😅

[@sheldonhowells3083]

@@dancub1 Yes, I do still like the song, but that line has always annoyed me a little!

[@TimvanderLeeuw]

This is the first Mike Oldfield track that I heard, when it came out and became a hit on the radio. I was still young, just started my secondary education and was just starting to get into listening to my own radio! At some point later in life I bought the CD. I listened a lot to it but haven't for quite a while... You're bringing back memories! And the songs are as catchy as every, I find myself humming the tunes days after listening to your reactions! 😂

[@Someonelser1]

Always had a soft spot for this tune.

[@Someonelser1]

That guitar tone on the solo!

[@Eduardo-Ferreira1982]

Ahhh, so this is on an album! I thought it was only a single. This is a song very popular over here in Portugal. Sometimes I still hear it by the radio an on loudspeakers in some villages summer festivities.

[@adriankent603]

Outstanding song and performance, ethereal and hypnotic, something unique and intriguing, great reaction sir

[@trondsatre8615]

In Norway (and most of Europe), "Moonlight Shadow" is one of the most frequently played classic rock radio tracks

[@dirkschrauwen]

From epic suites to pop songs. He did it all 🙂

[@delorangeade]

I don't care about anything else Mike Oldfield has done, but this is a perfect track.

[@mightyV444]

Have you heard the non-album Single 'Crime Of Passion'? It's fairly similar and with male vocals 🙂

[@delorangeade]

@@mightyV444 I gave it a listen, and I agree about the similarity, but it also points up the difference, which is that it's the female vocal that really sells this track for me, and if a man had been singing it might have completely passed me by.

[@mightyV444]

@@delorangeade - Cool. Yeah, I guess Maggie's vocals are part of the reason why 'Moonlight Shadow' was a much bigger Hit and is still getting played fairly regularly today! 🙂

[@FabryLON]

I always connect Moonlight Shadow with a fun episode that happened about 20-25 years ago: together with my family and friends, I went to South Africa and, during our travel, ended up in a small town called Pilgrim's Rest. As we were having dinner, three of us (the younger ones in the group) noticed a jukebox in the corner and wanted to put some music. We noticed: "Oh, there's Moonlight Shadow by Mike Oldfield!" and, of course, selected it. Now, for whatever reason, the song didn't start, so we kept selecting it over and over...basically, for the next hour, Moonlight Shadow was going on repeat in the background; however, no one complained because it's such a good song :D

[@jeremyb5640]

Whatever Mike's intentions, this song was very much received as a beautiful reflection on Lennon's tragic passing, something the music world was still reeling from at the time. I grew up with Mike Oldfield's classic 1970s work playing in our house, but still have a soft spot for this album and this song in particular. Maggie's beautiful vocals and Mike's chiming guitar and the way it builds to a climax at the end - perfect.

[@robyourtime]

Beautiful song. That line "4am in the morning" really hits me...

[@coordinatezero]

As opposed to 4am in the evening, right? ;-) ;-) ;-)

[@AndyClayton-f5x]

I've not seen one of your vids for months. I had to get a new phone set up and I guess I wasn't offered your postings, on the new system. Forgot how good Mike Oldfield is. I've been taking a break from pop/ rock and getting into classical/opera for a while, which is new to me. Must say, I miss your old curtains, which appeared to have aliens on them. Could you hang them again? Just to liven up the backdrop? Hope to visit again soon.

[@murdockreviews]

Oldfield could do pop. But I actually prefer his other 'hits' "To France" and "Trick of the Light".

[@leethomas2155]

I prefer To France also... MS is a great song but far too overplayed.

[@mightyV444]

@@murdockreviews - He'd gotten a bit _too_ poppy for my taste with the later 'Islands' album!

[@murdockreviews]

@@mightyV444 definitely! That one's not for me.

[@jerkedevries]

@@murdockreviewsSide A of Islands is greatly composed. But the spiritual dimension gets stronger on that album, same goes for the heavier Earth Moving album. But personally I like Islands. Magic Touch is a ‘soulmate’ song I feel

[@edwardlosty549]

4am in the morning, as opposed to the other 4am in the afternoon.

[@coordinatezero]

...or the evening. 4am in the evening is my favourite time.

[@tullfan2560]

One of the classiest pop songs ever written IMO. It feels like Oldfield is continuing the male-female energy that ABBA got into their music. ABBA split up a year before this song came out.

[@KNOPFLERSGOD]

This is Mike's best known vocal song, it was perfect for Maggie Reilly to sing, the guitar solo is amazing too, and live it's even better, there is a 90's era live version where he goes all Sultans of Swing with it, you should watch that JP, not sure you have seen Mike play yet.

[@michaelgray5100]

Nice melodic song. I like the guitar. A bit different from what I'm used to from Mike Oldfield.

[@blackcatcentralmusic]

Interesting background on the song and "Houdini". Check out Kate Bush's song named "Houdini". It's beautiful.

[@martindavies1632]

For me Moonlight Shadow is the ultimate Pop Song. I love the whole arrangement and that it works perfectly when Oldfield plays it live.

[@FabryLON]

also, if you want to get more into Mike Oldfield, Tubular Bells 1 and 2 are absolute must!!

[@benoitdesmarais2948]

The original vinyl B side started with Mistake, followed by In High Places (with Jon Anderson) and finished with Moonlight Shadow. This song always sounded to me like a Cat Stevens mashup of some songs from his Teaser & The Firecat (Moonshadow's melody - Bitterblue for the agressive acoustic) and Catch Bull at Four, from 1971-72.

[@franckb8279]

Great pop tune. Great success on charts.

[@blackcatcentralmusic]

Annie Haslam covered this song on her second solo album circa 1989.

[@herb6677]

A song from my teenage days, everybody knew it then. Cheers!

[@DavidImiri]

This deserves to be his most popular "hit song", and it's always been one of my favorites of his short song tracks. Everything here is great, the singing, the guitars, the melody, the concept, the instrumentals - just a perfect polished little gem of a song. And I always did believe it was about John Lennon's murder, albeit in a veiled way, with the story lining up in important ways, but not quite matching in the details. I still can't hear it without thinking of John and Yoko. It's very interesting to hear Mike's response to that, and rings true. Maybe it wasn't in the forefront of his mind, but it was so strong in the zeitgeist then in the early 80's, and the imagery resonates.

[@martinparker1270]

Blackmore’s Night does a great cover of this song.

[@ThomasKnip]

This is a "love it and hate it" song. it actually is a good song with a sad story, but it was played beyond excess during the 1980's, it took me decades to recover. 😅

[@torbenyj]

All you said---My words - i'am 54 and crises and moonlight shadow just---who is he

[@jerkedevries]

I was 12 at the time, and was focused on Maggie Reilly, with her backing band (!). In 1996 I started listening to the rabbit hole named Oldfield. In ‘83 I was more intrigued by Michael Jackson and Thriller and the Jackson 5 and the Jacksons ‘Can you feel it?’

[@keithjones7390]

That's quite a coincidence, l was listening to this song earlier today, highly melodic with lovely guitar and vocal work.

[@Owlstretchingtime78]

There's no such thing as coincidence. 🕉

[@pentagrammaton6793]

[@terryroxburgh3276]

This track cost me £5 on a bet as I thought it was Sally Oldfield singing! Obviously I was wrong.

[@kenl2091]

Yes did it to some initial acclaim, Genesis certainly did it to a hugely improved bank balance, ELP did it to much indifference* and even Gentle Giant tried to do it to some derision. King Crimson had split up before anyone suggested that they do it and Pink Floyd did it by accident - write a hit pop single. Oldfield had had some single success before this but you could always apply the word 'quirky' to his single releases (I think you have still to hear his almost disco effort 'Guilty' from 1979) This was pure pop, made a lot of money but signalled the end for his prog followers. Some interesting good stuff was to come but you had to sit through a lot of dreck before you found it. * 'Fanfare...' was not pop.

[@Silber7]

I mean, he's mainly just the guitarist in a (top notch!) band here. Simon Philips. Legendary radio hit. German stations keep it in heavy rotation even today. His comments about keeping both sides happy mainly refer to the record label (Virgin) that pressured him to explore this side more. A few albums on, on Amarok, he spitefully designs an all for me and nothing for you! approach in anger... And then returned to full instrumentals in the 90s but until then, there are still some very nice (and some filler) songs following My assumption would be - many listeners back then would never bother to find out who the artist is (maybe associating it with a female singer), and those enough into music to research it's from him all already have the Tubular Bells album at home 😅

[@michaelfrank2266]

Reminded me of some British pop tunes of the 1960s. The bright and bouncy with female vocalist.

[@yw1971]

2 more ('To France' & 'Pictures in the dark') and that's it for Mike: the rest never reached this level

[@gavingraham2851]

I doubt Mike made many smarter decisions that trimming the intro of this by 25 seconds; the momentum of the track had already built, it was ready to go and, ideal length aside, it suited 1983 radio play to the ground. It's a heady mixture of off-the-cuff inspiration - as it's already been said, about Phil Spalding's memories of the recording session - and Mike's obsessive fine-tuning to find the right vocalist singing it the right way. Now I'm a fan, I love how you can hear Phil getting the feel of the bass part, and how he and Simon play more stridently the further they get in. It's a mark of how I must have felt aspects such as that that it made it on to my C-90 tape of radio-recordings at the time, before I came to like Oldfield. But that's another story!🙂

[@333wheeler]

Deff the most played MO song he ever released. Has been covered by countless others. Even Annie Haslam of Renaissance has a bash at it.

[@johngagliotti2744]

Annie Haslam did the song on her 1989 solo album.

[@tullfan2560]

So did Blackmore's Night in 2015.

[@Eduardo-Ferreira1982]

Wasn't Simon Philips on Priest Sin After Sin? (I'm changing subject, ahah. Tank you!)

[@richardhal]

Please listen to Pictures In The Dark, a non-album single that should have been a much bigger hit than it was!!!

[@MartinWeng]

Great reaction to Mike Oldfield ❤ Pleace react to Lara Fabian ❤ One of my absolute favorites from Lara is Perdere l'amore kzbin.info/www/bejne/o5TQmXacfZ6CnLM In Italien Love Lara ❤ Love from Denmark ❤

[@TheGenreman]

Dave Angel eco warrior

[@thesoundlikechameleons2082]

Yes!

[@TechGuyBloke]

Maggie Reilly is best remembered for her time with the jazz-funk outfit Cado Belle. Sadly their career was short-lived. kzbin.info/www/bejne/rp7WdIiXbsuYe8ksi=l38L5Ui9NoEGzMzd

[@tortheatre2595]

I hated this song when it came out because it "wasn't cool". My bad, because it's brilliant. Oldfield's production is superb, with the lush bed of acoustic guitar, the thunderous toms in the drums and the perfect echo on the vocals. The song swells magnificently through the not one, but two! guitar solos until by the end Maggie's vocals have transformed from breathy folk to full on rock as we too are carried away. My one gripe is that it fades too early!

[@jesuslouzan8562]

Search and pay attention to Wikipedia...it is really dangerous. In short, you had to live through the 80s and specifically 1883, to know what Mike Oldfield was at that time and what Moonlight Shadow was. Music journalism always treated Oldfield very unfairly for not being the artist they wanted him to be with them. Moonlight shadow is the perfect song, Maggie's voice makes it seem like a sweet ballad, Simon Philips' drums and Oldfield's guitar give it enormous strength. It does not go on unnecessarily, it does and says exactly what it should in the way it should and for the time it should. I think trying to understand what Oldfield was at that time by reading Wikipedia is very risky. And today we neither appreciate nor understand what it meant to make an LP for an artist, much less listen to an album as it was done before.

[@daxtear]

German classic rock radio liked to drone this song over and over in the 2000s. Imagine my shock listening to Mike Oldfield chronologically years later and arriving at crises, finding this on side 2. I don't like pop Oldfield much, but I have a soft spot for some stuff on Discovery. I feel that album's pop songs are much more fun - possibly due to not having a side "for him" so his creativity seeped into that stuff. Idk, but either way I kinda hate this song.

[@sphericalharmony1603]

I find some of the production choices a bit cheesy, like the reverb on the vocals, but the guitar solo really elevates this song.

[@jamespaivapaiva4460]

🌞✌️&❤

[@jameswarner5809]

This track has one of those lyrics that just bugs me grammatically. '4 a.m. in the morning'...why? WHY!? Either the 'a.m.' or 'morning' are redundant. To make it scan, just replace 'a.m.' with 'o'clock' for goodness sake (takes several deep breaths)... I'm OK. I'm good!

[@a.k.1740]

Saccharine stuff I didn't like at the time, and still annoys me to this day. For me, Mike Oldfield can be summed up in his first five albums (including the double live album Exposed) and that's it.

[@pentagrammaton6793]

Totally. And talented as he doubtless was, he got very lucky becoming famous overnight at such a young age. I guess I was always more into the Berlin Scene synth stuff.

[@a.k.1740]

@@pentagrammaton6793 What is clear is that Oldfield peaked artistically for seven years (1972 to 1979) and then suddenly gave in to doing more mainstream stuff under pressure from his record company. The classic case of the successful cult artist held back by the music business.😉

[@pentagrammaton6793]

@@a.k.1740 exactly, which is why I'm a poor musician! 😆

[@a.k.1740]

@@pentagrammaton6793 Music business sucks all the way!😉

[@paulcollins5586]

Bit overplayed now but i prefer trick of the light.

[@SpaceCattttt]

Not a fan, then?

[@emdiar6588]

This song is ruined for me, by one clumsy, redundant line: The tautological "4 AM in the morning". As opposed to what Mike? 4 AM in the afternoon? Drives me fcking mad. He could have written '4 o'clock in the morning' and would have scanned just fine but no; he makes absolutely sure that we know that he is talking about 4 *AM* IN THE *MORNING* .

[@jfergs.3302]

Twee tosh...

[@jaymacgee_A_Bawbag_Blethering]

Thank phook it wasn’t just me that thought that 👌 👍🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

[@delorangeade]

Twee works perfectly for me with this one. I love it.

[@jfergs.3302]

@@delorangeade I suppose someone has to like twee :)

[@jtenaz]

Mike Oldfield? Zzzzzzzzzzzzz