Magnetic Fields

Magnetic Fields opens in a more Tangerine Dream style - an 18min side-long sequence-driven beauty. The sequences start off fast and furious, a pace kept right up until the middle of the piece. The music slows into some desolate and discarded music, sounding like an aural junkyard with its metallic tones. This section lasts just a few minutes before a new sequence-driven section kicks in to close off the first half. At 18 minutes, it really doesn't seem that long.

The second half contains the single - Magnetic Fields Part 2. An energetic and percussive track that would be in his live setlist even as late as 1997's Oxygene 7-13 tour. This segues into Part 3 - a short passage of almost ethnic-sounding metallic percussion. This minimalist interlude paves the way for Part 4, another highlight. Part 4 consists of a pleasant lead line overlapping a soft bass sequence, not as commercial sounding as Part 2, but equally hummable. Part 5, dubbed "The Last Rumba", is exatly that: a Rumba. Like the Sailor's Hornpipe ending of Mike Oldfield's "Tubular Bells", its place on the album is one of those "???!!!" moments. You don't know why it's there, but it just is - after a few plays, you just accept it.

For any self-respecting Jarre fan, "Magnetic Fields" is a must have, but perhaps less so for the casual e-music fan. From here, the door is pretty much open to any of Jarre's other works, but "The Concerts in China" comes recommended to hear how the album turned out in concert, albeit performed infront of a curious but receptive Chinese audience.

Some have said that Magnetic Fields sounds more "mechanical" than the others and there is good reason for this. This was the first album Jarre made using the brand new Fairlight synthesiser, although it would be called a "workstation" today, combining as it does a very powerful synthesiser with a sequencer and sampler (with a sample rate of 96Khz and an onboard memory of 16MB - not too shabby for 1981!) It cost around $60,000 dollars when new, so Jarre really tried to get his money's worth, using it in every album up to, I think, 1989's "Revolutions". However, the drawback of this synth is that it had a very 1980s digital "harshness", which contrasts with the smooth, organic sound of the 1970s analogue synths.

Jean-Michel Jarre's music usually falls into two categories - Dreamy, synthesised soundscapes and cheesy Euro-pop. Unfortunately both are represented on this album.

The first track, weighing in at some fifteen minutes is one of Jarre's masterpieces. The first part rolls along mechanically but catchily, his ever-present drum machine tinnily clicking and popping away to itself in the background. The second part is where it gets interesting. Jarre creates a dreamy soundscape over which he puts vocal samples, distorted and processed into some strange alien language (yes, he experimented with this before Zoolook). It ends with some wonderful sampled jet aircraft, flying from one side of the sound-field to the other before (and this is the best bit) suddenly cutting off and bursting into the third part, which is widely regarded as one of his best tunes (yes, that IS a Vocoder, and yes, it does sound great, doesn't it?)

Part 2 I really don't like, largely because it falls into the cheesy Euro-pop category and has dated very badly, but also because I played the game Bombjack incessantly as a kid and this used to be the in-game music!

Part 3 is wonderfully understated, beginning with sampled mechanical sounds before evolving into a beautiful dreamlike sequence with tinkling synths and bubbling arpeggios. This gradually becomes Part 4, a great tune in the classic Jarre style.

Part 5 is entirely superfluous, a song whimsically subtitled "The Last Rumba" and (deliberately or not) sounding like it was played on a £50 Casio keyboard!

This is not Jarre's best or most well known album, and if you are just discovering him you might think twice about buying this. But if you are interested in Jarre's work, it can be a very rewarding and enjoyable listening experience.